| Jonni Gil | Friday, May 20, 2011 - 12:08 pm 
The next update of Simcountry will include a change in the trading of: Weapon Grade Uranium.
The trading of Weapon Grade Uranium is moving to the space station Carina only.
Trading on carina was possible for a long time but as of the next update (May 24 or 25), it will be traded on the space station only.
There will be no trading of Weapon Grade Uranium on the world markets. Contracts between countries and direct sales of the product remain possible.
Spacecraft maintenance unit
Spacecraft maintenance unit will be introduced as well. As of the next patch, each shuttle flight will cost 1 Spacecraft maintenance unit. When a flight is done without one, the shuttle will age faster than the normal rate.
Selenium
Selenium will be added as a new product in Simcountry.
Selenium will be used first in the production of Glass but will be added as component to more products in the future.
Selenium will be produced on White Giant only and trading will take place on the Gemini space station.
The addition of Selenium will take place by the end of may. |
| Maestro2000 | Friday, May 20, 2011 - 03:57 pm
Looking forward to seeing some world unique stand alone luxury products added to the game. |
| Jo Salkilld (White Giant) | Friday, May 20, 2011 - 07:44 pm
Thanks for letting us know in advance Jonni. The more the GMs can do this, the easier it will be for the players to prepare for changes which, dependent on the nature of the change, sometimes takes a long time.
Hugs and respect
Jo |
| Laguna | Thursday, May 26, 2011 - 07:32 pm
Over the years, I've slowly been changing my position towards a more sympathetic view of the introduction of natural resources. While the previous perfect competition market allowed everyone to excel freely, introduction of natural resources has the appeal of creating discrepancies in the market, which gives an opportunity for profit thus stimulating activity.
I don't know how much selenium each shuttle will transport, what it's price will be and how much will be needed by glass factories, but I have to give a word of caution. One thing is to limit production to a world of a weapon with low usage, another is to limit production of necessary supplies to the world market. It is very possible that no one will move selenium to other worlds, or that very little trading will take place, if it isn't profitable enough, when all costs are taken into account, or because there's a lack of shuttles, or players hoard it themselves or few will care at all to move it all. In any of theses cases, there will be a disruption of the world market as selenium disappears, followed by glass and then by household products.
If the game pumps selenium into the world market to avoid disrupting shortages, then there really isn't a problem at all. But, if the opportunity is always there to make a buck by selling selenium, it isn't an engaging one; it defeats the purpose of introducing natural resources. This is boring mercantilism.
If this Space Travel limitation is going to be our version of "natural resources", it is a very barren one. |
| Josias (Kebir Blue) | Thursday, May 26, 2011 - 09:51 pm
i have to agree with LG. the thought to limit certain products to one world... ok, but which ones? the concept that a vital supply is avaible on only one world, makes me think that all the other worlds will suffer. like LG said, if selenium is a required resource, available on only WG, AND, several large space trading players do their duty to move the product to other worlds... then your average player wont loose out. how ever, if players are more interested in moving around their military (such as myself,) or just aren't interested... then LU will quickly have ZERO glass corps...
further, isolating one type of nuke to fb, cool, but isolating a vital military weapon such as fighters... well, i can see a problem their.
to offer well, a new thought, on world specific products, why not make a fighter/interceptor, that can only be built on WG. or attack/defensive helis? you see what i'm getting at? you can combine light and heavy tanks, MRMB and DMB, ... and so on, and so forth... on all worlds you'd still be able to build and buy fighters or interceptors that would allow you the basic combat features, but only on WG would you be able to build a fighter/interceptor corp. |
| Billy_Bob_Joe_Bob_Steve (Kebir Blue) | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 01:00 am
It could get even worse. Imagine you have some highly desirable product, being made only on one world. Imagine it only goes through one space station, and one or two people own all the docking stations. So then, if it had been a few months (real), and that product was used in making a lot of much used products, say weapons, then those one or two people could close the bottleneck and limit it to a single world. Then a much needed product would be cut off on four out of five planets, and the economies would suffer greatly. On five out of five planets, possibly. |
| warfreak (White Giant) | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 02:14 am
I agree that there should be some sort of world-restricted product, but they should just be new products, not existing.
Something like selenium which is required in glass, all well and good, but if there is a GM supply, it really isn't restricted, and if there isn't, 4 words will have a crippled glass industry.
The new products should be SUPER products. I have no idea what this could be. Perhaps new GOVT buildings, like Vocational Schools, which don't contribute to EDU Index (not essential), but increase the rate low level workers move to medium, and then to high. It isn't essential for industry, but it would be pretty advantageous.
Another would be like a unit. Like a Fighter/Bomber, not as good as an interceptor, not as good as a bomber, but it can attack both.
One more could be biofuel or something. When you purchase it, it can turn into either aircraft fuel or gasoline at your choice. Like nuclear power.
Or a strategic weapon like thermobaric weapon, which is a strategic weapon, does not use nuclear material, but about as powerful as a nuke. Make that FB only.
See, things like this, it isn't essential to the game, and it does retain that exclusivity. |
| Maestro2000 | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 02:34 am
@warfreak - Some good ideas there
On a side note, will this space trading effectively turn the 5 worlds into 5 continents?
Just my gut feeling on the subject.
I'm still waiting for more automation. Charge me a fee to move products from one world to another. Let the gamemaster run the shuttle business and make the vig on the trade. |
| hymy1 (Kebir Blue) | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 03:30 am
I've already closed all my household products corps, and I suspect others did too. There was a dip in the numbers of those corps briefly. |
| warfreak (White Giant) | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 05:32 am
I mean, I get the concept that something like a new essential resource to promote space. But the logistics.
If the GM only supplied Q100 Selenium on all other worlds to keep industry going, and only Q100+ was available on WG, then it's ok, those who do shuttle runs will make profit.
The fact is, space is sort of flawed. A lot of the people, including C3s, who will end up producing Selenium, won't be able to launch them into space since it is more or less a member's feature.
For this to work, there needs to be a GM space feature. You build the space center, but hire a GM shuttle. Has to be a set cost. Set cost will be maintenance+value of shuttle depreciation+profit.
Allow enterprises to do this as well. Allow them to own the shuttles and send them on trade missions. Let them make money off this. I think, the more ways people can play the game, the better.
The expansion of space I see will lead to either one of the two, or even both. First, it will allow for empires across worlds, or allow to build new empires on asteroids, etc. Otherwise, what on earth would you be fighting for on space wars?
I want my own asteroid... |
| Josias (Little Upsilon) | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 08:29 am
also lg, on another thing you said, before, about this being a hobby, your right. it is hobby. |
| CorporatePartner | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 11:26 am
Nice ideas "warfreak".
The idea to include CEOs in space is an excellent one. |
| Tom Willard | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 12:06 pm
There will be more new natural resources and other products added to Simcountry that will be produced on 1 or 2 worlds but traded on space stations only.
it means that if you want to use the resource, you will have to purchase it on a space station or, someone else will purchase it on a space station, transport it to the world where you reside and sell it to you in a direct contract.
Natural resources are on our plan for a log time, you can find references in older game news.
Corporations producing coal, oil etc. will exhaust the location at some time and will close. search for resources will deliver new location in all worlds to setup new corporations.
countries will issue (sell) the right to mine to CEOs.
In addition, we now decided to add asteroids where specific natural resources can be mined and these materials will have a very high quality.
the use of such materials will allow the production of much higher quality products.
these resources, can be picked up by players with their own cargo shuttles or they can either just ignore these products or purchase them in direct contracts on their own world.
We think that such asteroids, in combination with space war features will add interesting functions to Simcountry. |
| Tom Willard | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 12:10 pm
GM space services will increase the intervention of the GM in the game while we are trying to reduce it.
Don't forget that all products can be sold player to player by one time sales or by long running contracts on all worlds.
This means that everyone who produces selenium or any other product that is traded on a space station, will be able to sell the products to another player who will transport them to the market. |
| Tom Willard | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 12:16 pm
Essential products will of course remain on all the worlds. both production and sales will remain unchanged.
some existing products, some weapons and some new products will be traded on space markets only.
If space trading grows, we will either add more docking stations on space stations or add more markets where the same products can be traded.
also, if the total size of our galaxy grows, trading might become more local to prevent long missions to far away markets. |
| Tom Willard (Fearless Blue) | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 12:25 pm
Space trading and inflated pricing
Please make sure you check the price requested for products on space stations.
we have seen a tactical nuclear weapons offered for 2 gold coins per unit.
The production price is between 10B and 30B for a top quality unit.
2 gold coins is currently 540B. This is 17 times the max price. more like 40 times the average price.
GM will start offering some products at a reasonable price to create a roof and prevent cheating of unsuspecting players. |
| Laguna | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 01:29 pm
The core problem is: you have no guarantee that those resources will be supplied, with so few players.
How is selenium not essential, when it is required for glass, which is required for household products? Are you expecting the game to supply glass out of nothing? |
| Danny Miller (Little Upsilon) | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 04:08 pm
For once I agree with Laguna, glass is an essential product since its used in household products, which is used by a great number of other corp types like FMU, which has the highest $ demand of any product in simcountry. This is a train wreck waiting to happen. A better idea would have selenium be tied to new products that you are planning to introduce.
Ah, just read Warfreak's post. Nice post! |
| Tom Willard | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 06:07 pm
We will not guarantee the supply of Selenium.
it will be profitable and we expect players to produce and supply it.
in the mean time, we will not allow the glass production to collapse with all consequences but will, as we do with services, make sure we supply some without changing the shortage into an oversupply.
if Selenium price goes very very high and glass too, at some point someone will do it.
FMUs are doing great and some players are making a lot of money out of them. |
| Danny Miller | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 06:31 pm
You need to take a customer service class, Tom. Misleading customers and /or making unannounced changes is not a good business practice, and you have a track record of doing so. What is the real reason, are you trying to nerf FMU's and Household Products like you did product quality a few years ago? You are correct about someone making Selenium if the price goes high enough, but you said no changes to essential products. |
| Laguna | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 08:28 pm
You think just because selenium's price will be high (compared to base), we will move it? That selenium really better have a high base price.
And question is if not one player will do it, it's if enough players will do it at a scale large enough. And even then, that is still not good enough because:
Quote:If the game pumps selenium [or glass] into the world market to avoid disrupting shortages, then there really isn't a problem at all. But, if the opportunity is always there to make a buck by selling selenium, it isn't an engaging one; it defeats the purpose of introducing natural resources. This is boring mercantilism.
We're just moving stuff around...
The one positive thing about what was posted is:
Quote:Corporations producing coal, oil etc. will exhaust the location at some time and will close. search for resources will deliver new location in all worlds to setup new corporations.
countries will issue (sell) the right to mine to CEOs.
This puts players in contact with eachother and it allows a player to influence a market through work and crazy schemes. As we are not in a shortage of crazy people, this will work well. Moving stuff around to satisfy essential product isn't crazy, it's boring. |
| alan watt (White Giant) | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 08:51 pm
I don't really have an opinion on this, except I love the fighter/bomber idea from above. Since all wars are now against the computer, this would be quite handy. |
| Tom Willard | Friday, May 27, 2011 - 09:09 pm
Rejecting any change we make will get you nowhere.
We have added many products in the past, and saw similar messages.
nothing happened.
Selenium is a first new product for now.
there will be many more.
we have added raw materials to the production process of existing products before and we have taken measures to prevent any problem in the markets.
some time ago, we did not have factory maintenance units and today it is the largest product.
glass will be unaffected and house hold products too. we have no interest in disruption of any market.
there will be new products, new quality levels and new opportunities for players who are interested.
anyone who likes the current situation will continue to play the current functions.
|
| Crafty (Little Upsilon) | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 07:13 am
Quote:anyone who likes the current situation will continue to play the current functions.
How is this true Tom? It is a total contradiction to what Jonni says in his first post and indeed what has been said to be your plan all along. Products are going to be tradeable only on space stations in effect forcing me to use the space system which I currently have no interest in.
Can I have the option to play within the current functions please, or can you not state outright falsehoods. |
| Green | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 07:27 am
I agree with Crafty in this thread also. Not to mention click, click, click, click. Endless, boring, clickity clicking. Just to move commodities around. Utterly dull. |
| shirokikuroyami (Little Upsilon) | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 09:08 am
Things will continue along as normal, since none of the markets will be disrupted, this has to mean that the supply fairy will magically create the supplies to keep the industries going.
So nothing will change, and I expect unless selenium is worth in the hundreds of thousands, per unit and it translates to a 1 unit of product to 1 cargo unit. It will be ignored. Though that assumption is going purely on memory, since I don't know what the current costs would be. It's been awhile, but I take it that things are no longer free.
I'm not even going to get started on FMUs. I understand the logic of their creation, but I have my own opinions on their application. |
| Tom Willard | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 10:08 am
First and essential in the discussion:
all products, independent of place of production and trading, can be bought and sold on all worlds between players and in contracts.
This remains true for everything, including nuclear weapons, Selenium and all future new products.
Most products used by the population and products used in the production of most used products will continue to be traded on all the markets in all the worlds.
This will allow players who are not interested in the space trading, space mining or space war to continue and play as they do now.
In addition, there will be products that are produced on one world only but can be traded everywhere.
Players who are interested in additional functions, will be able to participate in the space trading, mining etc.
It will give them more game functionality. The products that are involved will in general be used in industries that require high game levels.
some products will be produced on one world only and traded everywhere.
If such products are in short supply in any of the worlds, we are quite sure that they will be moved around and be sold on all the markets.
If not, we might move such products ourselves. buy them in one place and sell them elsewhere.
Selenium is one of these products. the quantities will be small in comparison with the capacity of a cargo shuttle and if no player is interested in making money on selenium and move it to a different world, we will indeed as long as needed.
We do not need to create products out of nothing, we can just move them.
There are and will be more products that are produced in one or more worlds and traded on space stations only.
Nuclear weapons are in this group. These are not traded on any world for a very long time.
If you want a nuclear weapon you already need to make the effort.
In addition, as is said before:
All products can be traded between players and in contracts on all the worlds. This include all the nuclear weapons, selenium and all future products.
You don't need to go anywhere, just purchase these products from another player.
Our interventions in the markets:
These are as old as the game.
If services are in short supply to a level that corporations stop production, the entire world market can be disrupted.
We added small quantities from time to time to ensure nothing bad happened but we never made a shortage into a surplus.
Most time, no interventions are needed and we never do it manually. we measure and if needed, add a small percentage of the shortage.
We also added product if it was new and there was no corporations making it. these interventions are usually stopped within a week or two as many new corporations are created to produce it.
example: Factory Maintenance units.
After the introduction, we had to supply product or everything would stop. Now it is probably the largest product in the game and a very profitable one. |
| shirokikuroyami (Little Upsilon) | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 10:58 am
All well and good, but how those interventions have appeared on this end to players are as follows:
Shortages have no meaning or bearing. The only time I remember a shortage of a commodity actually halting production was either due to database issues where some weapon corp had a call for the same supply commodity twice and only filled the need once or pre-Factory Maintenance Unit, where upgrading corporations causes a Services/High Tech Services see-saw effect. I distinctly remember in 2003 having to frequently immediately order services or high tech services, or build my own corporations to supply them and then manually cut contracts to my other corporations. Thus the common market was born. To keep many of them operational, whereas now, I don't experience shortages
The Factory Maintenance Unit, I would consider one of the poorest examples to cite for a thriving economy, since if you run out of Factory Maintenance Units the production doesn't stop. You can go negative in quantity and they have no meaning except costs start to rise. As it currently stands, the "economy" of these worlds is not dynamic, most players build a very narrow subset of corporations via CEO accounts to function. Factory Maintenance Unit, Electric Power, Oil, High Tech Services, etc. I don't remember the full list. I don't pay attention. From there, they depend on your actions to maintain their function, either via the automated activities of the computer controlled countries/corporations, or the ongoing supplies that just magically appear from the aethers.
I assume that part of the impetus behind corporations having level requirements to build was an attempt to force people to diversify their holdings. A more effective method from my view would be to force people to address shortages. If there's a consistent shortage in something, production should halt, forcing people to address the problem. If my chemicals corporation stopped production because there's a shortage of sulphur. I'd think about going out and getting a sulphur corporation active. Whereas, if I did take steps to monopolize the sulphur industry and then witheld the production, no one would notice.
As it stands, there is a nice little cycle going where you are yearly or more often "increasing the size of corporations" to reduce overall numbers. Invariably Factory Maintenance Unit production and consumption increase. The Factory Maintenance Unit corporation has been the highest quantity of the bunch since 2009 that I'm aware of personally. I wouldn't be surprised if this corporation had been the largest since its inception. But since these things are one of the few items that most people build, and everything else will magically appear, there's really no impetus for the player community to alter their dynamic. All the other things appear by magic. Why bother with anything else?
Should there be some interference to keep things functioning? I would have to say yes. But on the flipside, should the interference be so dramatic that the continuous average shortfall of air transport of 2.5 billion units on Little Upsilon be meaningless? If shortages have no effective meaning to the players, then why should I build anything besides the Factory Maintenance Unit? |
| Maestro2000 | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 12:31 pm
@Green "Not to mention click, click, click, click. Endless, boring, clickity clicking. Just to move commodities around. Utterly dull."
I agree 100%
Like regular trading on individual worlds, we need the same simplicity in space trading.
When trading on any world we don't load trucks, railcars, ocean liners with products. We offer the goods on the world market and magic the products are sold.
We need the same magic for space trade. Any country with a space center should have the ability to directly trade on the space market. Instead of using cargo shuttles, just charge each trade a percentage fee and be done with it. Also, CEO's should be allowed to space trade as well.
This cargo shuttle thing is way to much micromanagement.
*****
And a little reality would be nice here.
Space trading should be cost prohibitive to most if not all current world products.
Think about it. You can build cars in China today for $10,000, add shipping cost and sell it anywhere in the world. People are buying these cars.
but
Build a car on "Mars" for $10,000 add $1 million per in shipping costs and you'll not find many buyers.
Thoughts, suggestions? |
| Blueserpent | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 12:50 pm
You will probably find the space shuttles are needed for space wars.
How else am i gonna pirate your goodies being transfered round the worlds  |
| Crafty (Little Upsilon) | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 12:56 pm
Yeah? well I hope it goes the same way as the Apollo program and the series of shuttles. i.e. in the bin. |
| Tom Willard | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 02:27 pm
There are shortages on the market and as a result, the products increase in price.
none of our interventions reversed any of these shortages or caused a decline in the price.
A very large number of corporations, are not producing at 100% because of these shortages and we never intervene.many corporations are bankrupted every day because of this. They cannot produce due to the shortages, they get into debt and bankrupt when production remains very low for a prolonged period.
factory maintenance units are not produced in sufficient numbers although the situation is improving.
once a sort of a balance will be in sight, corporations will stop production if they do not have the product.
if we do it now, many corporations will stop or we will have to intervene.
with new space trading functions and more diversity in the way products get to the markets, we will allow wider price ranges and possibilities to create very profitable corporations on one hand and easier bankruptcy when oversupply drives prices very low.
example:
Check the price of quality and efficiency upgrades in the past two or three days.
also, check PE ratios for public corporations in the past 18 game months.
|
| warfreak (White Giant) | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 02:55 pm
That is my main concern with this specialist products thing. Sure, with Strat bombers, I understand (having built 2 strat bomber corps + 1 strat bomber bomb corp before the cutoff) with the world trading, but for normal items?
Maestro is right in saying that it would not be cost effective to move smaller units. Say you sell 100,000 units of computers. How do you make up the cost of transport by doing that?
This is the reason when I built my country, my refusal to go the let the CEO handle things route was to diversify my corps, so if one corp goes into prolonged green spells, other corps will cover it. Keep my portfolio protected from oversupply, and wait. Classic case was when Industrial Equipment was in a massive greenspell, I kept it going, and now it's back in the black.
One thing that no one has picked up on is exhausting natural supplies. I understand that this is realism, makes perfect sense. What is concerning however, is that when you have a trillion dollar company, they shouldn't just suddenly close down. They move elsewhere. And it also would be a bit mean to lose all the money you've spent to upgrade that corp. My opinion would be for the owner, CEO or president, to pay money, like $100M SC to magically discover more resources in their country. It isn't exhausting in the corps closing sense, but it will be a 'move on to another area' cost.
My final thoughts on this special products thing is this. It seems to me that I should start thinking of setting up empires on other worlds, because I think that either no one will bother trading world-specific items (unlikely), or that there would be a very expensive cost attached to them (very likely). |
| Maestro2000 (Fearless Blue) | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 02:57 pm
I'm all for cargo shuttles being part of space wars and space exploration. |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 08:32 pm
Yes, the price of quality and effectivity products has hit the ceiling on Little Upsilon. Nothing new there. Things hit the ceiling all the time. P/E ratios are moving around based upon whether their product is flagged as in a surplus or shortage, nothing new or exciting there.
Factory maintenance units will never go into surplus. The community is now brainwashed to instantly snap these up if they see a surplus, even though there is no actual need.
I will agree with you on your interventions not reversing a situation or affecting a price. But pricing, I don't care about. That should move with whatever the commodity is flagged as, shortage or surplus. I do however fondly remember air transport going from a 4.x+ billion short fall once to a 1.x billion short fall. Nothing else was affected by this.
But if you do have intentions to actually cause the situation where a shortfall in a product has meaning, then the whole concept will be more worthwhile.
Until then, I'll be building more Factory Maintenance Units corporations, just like everyone else. |
| hymy1 (Kebir Blue) | Saturday, May 28, 2011 - 10:24 pm
Quote:I assume that part of the impetus behind corporations having level requirements to build was an attempt to force people to diversify their holdings. A more effective method from my view would be to force people to address shortages. If there's a consistent shortage in something, production should halt, forcing people to address the problem. If my chemicals corporation stopped production because there's a shortage of sulphur. I'd think about going out and getting a sulphur corporation active. Whereas, if I did take steps to monopolize the sulphur industry and then witheld the production, no one would notice.
This used to be the case in the very early years of the game, and it was indeed alot more fun. |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Sunday, May 29, 2011 - 01:14 am
Like logging in to find everything ground to a halt because there's a 4 billion unit services shortage for the world. Those were the days. |
| SuperSoldierRCP (Little Upsilon) | Sunday, May 29, 2011 - 04:08 am
i agree with White Darkness
Failures need to be added.
Make CM worth while, make buying higher Q worth something.
A Wheat corp uses 106FMU monthly
A Sub Nuke corp uses 96 monthly
WHY DOES FOOD NEED MORE FMU THEN A NUKE!?!? |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Sunday, May 29, 2011 - 04:09 am
"A very large number of corporations, are not producing at 100% because of these shortages and we never intervene.many corporations are bankrupted every day because of this. They cannot produce due to the shortages, they get into debt and bankrupt when production remains very low for a prolonged period."
Missed this part from you earlier,Tommi. The only time I've seen a shortage actually interfere with production for any of the corporations I've had in my possession since 2009 was due to either database issues, or my setting ridiculous trade strategies that just wouldn't work. Otherwise, that 4B shortfall in air transport as an example has been around since '09 when I re-signed up and has had no impact, though at the time when my empire was intact it did cause me to build 4 air transport corporations per country, because there was a guaranteed sale. A guaranteed sale, because most people don't bother. |
| Tom Willard (White Giant) | Sunday, May 29, 2011 - 01:10 pm
The number of FMUs used by corporations, depends mainly on their quality level.
As I said, PE levels are falling because of a change in the way we compute PE ratios.
this is why we are tweaking the conditions for an IPO.
we hope in fact that there will be more IPOs in the future and a smaller number of state corporations.
public a private corporations contribute more to the countries where they reside. we have done this to stimulate these types of corporations, not to block them.
The price of upgrading products did not just hit the ceiling. you probably did not look.
the ceiling went way up and their profitability increased.
we think that with the current functionality, and added space functions including the automation, there is a lot to improve in the trading and economy of Simcountry.
quality is a factor in an increasing number of products.
weapons, ammunition, space industry, and all raw materials as they influence the output quality. This represents by far, most of the products.
When natural resources become limited per location, corporation market value will also depend on the unused reserves.
The economy of such corporations will have to change and they will have to become more profitable to compensate for their expected demise.
The countries will be compensated by the sale of the concessions to mine and the corporations will have a different cost structure. |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Sunday, May 29, 2011 - 09:52 pm
Aye, I'll agree with you there. The number of FMUs depends on their quality level. A more stable scenario than High Tech Services consumption increasing.
2009, FMU consumption for all corporations was 66 at full upgrade level.
2011, varies wildly, in an apparent range from 90-125.
P/E doesn't really pertain to the aspects of supply/demand consumption, whether the calculations change or not.
The price of quality and effectivity upgrades on Little Upsilon are ceilinged. The shortage for effectivity is 13,756 at the moment and for quality 15,492. The prices for both are at approximately 300M per upgrade. The graphs of the price changes are now moving up and down in a wave style. What price commodities do once they hit the ceiling. There was a marked steady increase previously, but again, not really important. The prices could be 1 SC$ or 1 million.
There is, I was one of the "pioneers" of space and own the #1 dock on Carina. I was also the cheapest nuclear salesman for awhile up there. They were selling tacticals for 2 GC when space launched, my formula for prices was a little more complex. I love space on the aspect that it's the only portion of this game with a free market system and I can if I so choose apply the precept of "caveat emptor" to the hilt. If someone pays 5GC for a single strategic bomb. Then so be it. No refunds.
Aye I'm aware of the quality impact. I also remember a certain discussion on weapon and ammo upgrades not purchasing via automatic order.
Natural resources if implemented will be interesting, however this strikes back to the core point. Who cares if sulphur is limited? The player community typically doesn't build it. Most building occurs in a narrow, quasi-self-supporting band of corporations. The rest don't exist as far as they're concerned. Why do they not care? The supply system will make it appear by magic for their chemical corporations and then they don't have to worry.
As it stands Little Upsilon has 92 sulphur corporations. I would expect that a significant majority of those corporations are in computer controlled countries or in free accounts. Computer controlled countries are what the player community sits on top of and are partially dependent on. In the case of free accounts being targeted, I expect a number of them don't interact with the extant player community and either leave the corporation building automation active or just build stuff.
That's the point though, those who are established won't change. The system insulates them. So what if there's a continuous 190M shortfall on sulphur on Little Upsilon? The chemicals corporations aren't screeching to a halt. To be exact factor utilization for chemicals at the moment for chemicals is 103% while sulphur is 98%. Both are in a shortfall, and almost every bloody thing in the game uses chemicals.
Before working out that the shortages were essentially paper, I was at one point working on putting a stranglehold on the chemicals industry. At that time there were approx. 50 sulphur corporations supplying all of Little Upsilon. Approximately 60 rubber corporations and approximately 100 coal corporations. The number of these corporations has shifted, mostly due to tweaks in production/consumption numbers on your part.
If I had achieved a monopoly of those 3 items and then squeezed my fist, what would have happened? One would think that the chemicals industry and all industries tied to it would shudder in it's step.
In game reality. No one would have noticed. Everything would just keep going along as before. Some computer controlled countries would build more sulphur, rubber and coal. The price of those 3 commodities would go up, but nothing would happen.
If supply/demand had an impact, suddenly If I had squeezed, people would have noticed when some chemical corporations stuttered in production. If I'd squeezed hard, they would have stopped. Price would have gone up. The computer controlled countries would start building to address this dramatic and sudden shortfall. Some adventurous players might build one of the three I mentioned. Mostly, they'd complain and blame you.
If they were aware that supply/demand were meaningful, in the above scenario, they'd break my monopoly.
This is why, selenium won't really impact anything. You'll be supplying it. Nothing will change, and we'll just keep on building FMU corporations.
If moving it is economic, somebody will move it irregardless, just to address the shortage listed and rake in some essentially free money. Like hauling cheap shuttle fuselages from Kebir Blue to Little Upsilon, early on in the experience of the space program. 30 fuselages per shuttle. At the time it was 7B per fuselage on KB and LU was at 25B. No costs with launching a shuttle at the time. Having a fleet of 25 of them could make a nice profit. |
| warfreak (White Giant) | Monday, May 30, 2011 - 12:49 am
I'm still not sure about limited natural resources. Yes, I know it's a smarter thing to do (breaks the rich econ countries only mining oil), but it depends how you look at it.
The way I see it, one mining company should pretty much have unlimited resources to play with. I mean, one major oil company in a massive country should have plenty of room. However, have more than one, and you'll lose out on reserves.
Even if this isn't the case, then you will have to watch what is limited. You cannot limit wood for instance, it would be sustainable farming. Oil can't be limited that much, there is oil shale.
I am more interested about resources in space. If someone owns an asteroid, is there an infinite amount of resources? Also, how would it function, is it like another country, connected via space shuttles? That is interesting.
On that note, I have a few strat bombers to sell, they're draining manpower in my main country. |
| Maestro2000 (Golden Rainbow) | Monday, May 30, 2011 - 04:32 am
Mining asteroids....I like this idea. |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Monday, May 30, 2011 - 07:09 am
mining asteroids, combine that with throwing rocks, and then I'd be interested. |
| Jojo T. Hun | Monday, May 30, 2011 - 11:03 pm
White Darkness has it exactly.
Jozi has so many fun ideas. Then a few complaints, and W3C steps back from the fun aspect.
This is just a game, yet there's so much fear about free markets. Now I can see if in real life people would be afraid about things like not having any dairy farms in New York City, to supply everyone with milk. You'd have to rely on private companies outside the city to produce enough milk, and then rely on private companies to transport it into the city. What if no one wants to do it? No milk and cereal! We'd have no milk in our coffee! The city would grind to a halt! Getting rid of the dairy farms in NYC would be playing with fire, and I understand why in real life we don't do things like that, even though personally I think we'd manage. But this is just a game. Ditch the price controls and the "interventions" and let's have a real free economy. And no war protection on FB, either, while we're at it. |
| warfreak (White Giant) | Tuesday, May 31, 2011 - 02:41 am
I am concerned about lack of interventions though. After all, where would the FMUs come from? Those are in constant demand. |
| Accordion_This (Little Upsilon) | Tuesday, May 31, 2011 - 03:08 am
TL;DR: There are many things that need addressing in this game, many changes that need to be made to the core game, and there is no reason to add a whole new field (space) full of bugs to an already buggy game.
Seriously, guys, you're going to have more of a shot at maintaining your player base (and income) if you just fix the core game and leave space alone for a while. |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Tuesday, May 31, 2011 - 05:42 am
warfreak, FMUs are in demand constantly for a combination of things.
1. Since we have "infinite supply" effectively, we have infinite growth without consequences, so we build what is deemed to make the most profit. To counteract this to a degree since the sheer volume of corporations gets unwieldy, the GMs increase corporation size. Invariably this means the things use more staff and consume more FMUs. But the FMU corporations consume more as well. As it stands, a single FMU corp could not supply the FMUs necessary to all the corporations that supply it if they were all fully upgraded. 12 commodities counting FMU come in, and 765 are produced. Estimating a 95 average consumption (probably higher), that's 8 of the 12 supplied. Admittedly, those sources can probably support 2 or 3 FMU corps, so that helps counterbalance things.
2. People are to a degree brainwashed. If there is (and it has happened) a FMU surplus. Someone will snap them all up and drive them back into the red. We're all making the things, and we're all using them, so it's a self-feeding cycle. If my economy was FMU dependent and they went into surplus, I'd certainly buy a million of the ruddy things to drive it back into the negative. If that price slips from the ceiling it cuts into my profits.
3. I won't deny, that my personal thoughts for a first step would be to begin the process of marginalizing the FMU. It's 90-120 average for a fully upgraded corp. When i restarted in 09 they were 66. I don't remember the exact '09 FMU production but they make 765 optimally now. I think the '09 level was something like 465 or thereabouts. Plus, there are things outside of the small circle people are building now, like shuttle corps. The more things outside the tiny traditional area being built, the worse the shortage is. Fortunately, production doesn't halt, since the shortage just determines what the price is.
The draw back to making shortages meaningful is obvious though. If it was suddenly true that you're not going to get air transport because there's a 4 million world shortfall the whole "economy" of every world would fold up and die.
It'd have to be gradually phased in, weakening the supply fairy's magic gradually. Then people would have to step up to the plate. If my glass corporation screeched to a halt because there was no sand. I'd consider building a sand corp. In that scenario, everyone would have to start thinking that way. Rather than "electric power, oil, FMUs make the most, the rest is crap"
Secondly, it'd eliminate the "magic bullet" concept of corps. Take the FMU, it consumes insane amounts of resources. While I would have to recheck, it was the case that a single FMU corp fully upgraded could barely support the fully upgraded corps to feed its supplies.
That kind of leaves us with a stability problem right there. Admittedly, any sweeping changes would probably leave me very unpopular with the FMU crowd (but once I get the ball rolling again, I'll be part of it to. I know what butters my bread.), since if the price falls, there goes the income, but Sand might be considered viable. If shortages became meaningful, then the FMU black hole would have additional problems. Whereas unless things have changed, you can still run a corporation without any FMUs whatsoever. Certain fixed costs start going up.
If the supply is limited, then that checks growth, whereas with infinite supply there is infinite growth. The only thing that halts growth now is population.
So the challenges would be:
1. Getting people to adjust their game, rather than just complaining.
2. Overall there might be a loss of income for people. On the other hand there would be gains in variety and in what's viable to do. That wood corp might be a good thing suddenly.
3. This could with planning open things up to the potential for monopolization of certain resources. But this would truly create the option for economic warfare. The man who controls the sulphur corps, controls the world. <_< |
| Josias (Fearless Blue) | Tuesday, May 31, 2011 - 06:37 am
hey, i'd like to throw out again, a request for a teaser about space war??
are we building orbital weapons platforms? space mines? pirate ships? what? i'm sure if you had it all figured out, you'd do the update, i'm just wanting a taste of whats coming. and partially how to plan ahead for it. |
| warfreak (White Giant) | Tuesday, May 31, 2011 - 07:55 am
I think the amount of FMU needs is a bit too high. After all, I remember seeing on the forums that a fully upgraded FMU corp produces enough for itself, and another upgraded corp. We basically need 1 FMU corp for every other corp for it to breakeven.
I don't have a stack of FMU/Elec/Oil corps. I have one FMU, 1 Elec, 1 Oil, 1 Gasoline, I diversify my corps. Don't put all my eggs in one basket. So if the magical supply fairy were to disappear, I would be safe, worse comes to worst, I can supply my own country pretty well.
If we were to remove the black hole of FMUs and all, then either reduce the FMUs needed for maintenance, or increase production (and supply). For electricity, make that directly tied in with Nuclear, they are exactly the same.
Nuclear power is more or less dead at this stage. It doesn't make sense that there can be a surplus of nuclear and a shortage of electric at the same time. They're both the same thing. Why would there be 6.2k elec corps compared to 220 nuclear corps? They produce the same thing, different method.
I mean, to change the magical black hole of several resources will see a lot of econ players falling (how many of the top CEOs have diversified corps?). I'm basically playing CEO as president (out of my 5 countries, 3 non-state corps), more fun with more resources.
Another way is to make other resources more attractive. So basically, increase country consumption more, so food, recreation, certain industries, become more attractive.
Just throwing ideas off at the top of my head, but ideas none the less. By making other resources more attractive, it involves more market research, rather than just watching the demand of FMU, elec, and oil. |
| Tom Willard (Little Upsilon) | Tuesday, May 31, 2011 - 08:32 am
One fully upgraded FMU corporation with a good welfare index is producing enough for an average of 9-10 fully upgraded corporations.
Nuclear power corporations deliver electric power.
there is no Nuclear electric power. The output of both types is electric power.
we plan to add other power generating company types but they will all generate electric power.
------------------------------
There is no problem with FMUs or any other product. If we reduce the need for FMUs we will need to re-balance the corporations and other products will be used more.
The base of the economic model is the balance between the total income and money to spend, and the use of the money.
if there is more money around for products than the total of all products produced, we get shortages.
if "the people" in the countries will spend less, there will be structural overproduction. product pricing will decline and many corporations will bankrupt.
We are checking this balance all the time. We are not in control on a micro level. we can try to make corrections if it goes off balance but effects of what we try to do take time to materialize.
It is like turning a large tanker. You can turn the wheel but the tanker will not turn until some time later.
Currently, there is more money to spend than product to purchase. one way to make the model more stable is to allow for higher pricing which will reduce the amount of product you can purchase.
we have prepared some measures in the past year that will allow us to remove some limitations, and allow for more flexibility, opportunities and some disasters as a result of shortages. |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Tuesday, May 31, 2011 - 04:17 pm
Warfreak ~ The FMU corporation isn't that extreme. Not a 1 to 1 situation. I'm perfectly in line with Tommi on the approximate 9 to 10 when fully upgraded.
I've actually been surprised/impressed to see people being a little more diversified. I was discussing cutting costs on a shuttle corporation with someone recently and was shocked and awed to find they'd built a wood corporation.
Nuclear power isn't dead. It's just different. Take the 16,637,502 shortfall at the moment on Little Upsilon. I love nuclear power and when it was introduced I jumped on to that bandwagon asap. I haven't checked yet, to see if I can set things up so some is automatically ordered every month (I remember you used to not be able to do that) and it is slightly annoying that you have to buy it and then it converts to electric power, so you can't get it directly to the corporations. But that's just a couple of extra clicks when you want it. The difference between the two is because of the extra clicks, most of us are lazy. Minimum effort, maximum benefit.
Tommi ~ killing the "magic bullet" of the FMU corp would be one thing that would address your point of the balance between income and money to spend. If the shortfall on those things disappeared and that price sank from where it stays bumping against the ceiling towards the base price, there'd be a lot of people having to realign their entire methodology. Since they're dependent on that ceiling.
Now the thought of "disasters" in regards to shortages, has me interested. Since actual production halts due to shortage would be a "disaster" in and of itself, it would force a realignment massively, and if it allowed for a determined individual to monopolize because others aren't paying attention...though once someone squeezed with a monopoly successfully, people would be howling for blood. Economic warfare at it's finest. |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Tuesday, May 31, 2011 - 06:22 pm
Just rechecked, and there is no nuclear power monthly auto-order. Oh well. |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Thursday, June 2, 2011 - 11:09 pm
And I was just blessed with my first production halting shortage today.
Strangely, I'm happy. |
| alan watt (White Giant) | Thursday, June 2, 2011 - 11:17 pm
WD, simple answer is to stockpile fMUs in your country. It's my strategic stockpile, I just dipped into it and my corps are producing just fine through the shortage.
Of course if everyone does this than the problem gets worse lol |
| jambu mr jambu kick (Little Upsilon) | Friday, June 3, 2011 - 12:01 am
sorry frenzz...
i have many problm!!!!!!!!
u all jangan marahkan i..... |
| warfreak (White Giant) | Friday, June 3, 2011 - 12:36 am
I stockpile at least 200k FMU in my main country, and about 100k in my slaves. Mainly because it is cheaper for me to order over my corps, and well, strategic stockpile, like my stockpile of strat bombers. |
| white darkness (Little Upsilon) | Friday, June 3, 2011 - 02:14 am
FMUs don't stop production. You run out, nothing happens but your operating costs start to rise. The FMU is not important.
I'm sure almost every player is stocking them, but me. I don't care. I want them to surplus, and the price for those POS's to go down. They're the black hole we're going to have to deal with.
Now that gold shortage I had, that was important. |
| warfreak (White Giant) | Friday, June 3, 2011 - 02:48 am
Players are stocking them, we all know that, even still, FMUs aren't being supplied enough via factory production, factories don't cover them all.
And it isn't stocking them that is the problem, I don't want my corps ordering 185Q FMUs when 100Q would do. |
| alan watt (White Giant) | Friday, June 3, 2011 - 04:45 am
Production halting shortages in computer countries and others is probably the only thing that keeps the FMU shortage from getting exponentially worse. And of course the obvious interventionism. |
| Tom Willard | Friday, June 3, 2011 - 09:45 am
The only way FMU price can go down is if more people will build these corporations and there will be an oversupply.
The number of corporations increasing but not to the level that we can make FMUs "normal" products and have corporations stop on a shortage. This will eventually happen but will be announced several weeks ahead of time and repeated every week.
Realignment should take place all the time. We cannot wait for a disaster which is the point when shortages become very severe and thousands of corporations close.
It is then very difficult to restore the economy. |
| Crafty (Little Upsilon) | Friday, June 3, 2011 - 07:36 pm
Perhaps the game level at which a player can build FMU corps could be lowered a level or two to allow more to be built by newer players. |
| Solaris (Kebir Blue) | Friday, June 3, 2011 - 08:44 pm
Is there where I will find SC's version of Robert Peston?
I want some sim antics. Failing that L'd settle for semantics. |
| Solaris (Kebir Blue) | Friday, June 3, 2011 - 08:45 pm
*Is this where |
| Border C (Little Upsilon) | Saturday, June 4, 2011 - 01:34 am
Unless Robert Peston is a flaming troll or asshat, mooooooost likely not your best shot.
~Trolling Asshat |
| Crafty (Little Upsilon) | Saturday, June 4, 2011 - 03:18 pm
Hey, Border Collie, they dont make hats big enough to fit your ass, hahahahaha 
Though you probably live in a swamp under a bridge like a troll.
P.S. Did you get that job as a monkey on the Mars mission?
CC, Press officer, Asshat Patrol. |
| GameMiser | Friday, August 21, 2020 - 03:03 pm
Can MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF SECRETLY STORED SELENIUM be dumped onto the World Market or Space Stations to make a Very Large Profit??
Sorry, your spending limit been reached for this month.
The remaining credit for this month is 144,800 SC$.
You cannot buy another ton.
Wait until next month.
Is this boring mercantilism? |
| Zentrino | Friday, August 21, 2020 - 06:32 pm
This resurrected a really old thread to ask a questions. Fun times. |
| John Galt | Friday, August 21, 2020 - 06:57 pm
Man I was about to buy a ton of weapons grade uranium, then I saw the date lol. |
| Gaz | Friday, August 21, 2020 - 08:31 pm
I get a blast from seeing all the old names. I recognise many |
| The_Wicked_Lady | Saturday, August 22, 2020 - 02:39 am
Yeah, these folks go back to my heyday time in the game. I miss them all. Wish they would come back! |
| Andy | Wednesday, September 16, 2020 - 11:09 pm
I just sent a message in the game to an old player.
it will trigger an email message. |
| Gaz | Thursday, September 17, 2020 - 02:37 pm
Which player? |
| Andy | Thursday, September 17, 2020 - 05:58 pm
Warfreak
arbitrary. Just wanted to try one.
you are welcome to send them messages. |
