W3C - Game Upgrade July 29

Changes to the user interface

Some menu functions have been changed to make it easier to navigate.
The Departments menu option is removed and the separate departments became menu options. This change reduces the clicking when using these functions.
Some options that appeared in more than one place have been removed.
More such changes are underway as we try to streamline the user interface and reduce complexity.

Corporations

Many updates to corporations will in general improve profitability. Small updates to the corporation models will probably result in a slightly larger production level and with it higher profitability.

Some corporations that are producing fractions of products each month, now produce a little bigger fractions. This kind of changes are aimed at reducing the production of fractions in general and make it possible to set up contracts for such products.

Corporate sizes

Many types of corporations continue to become larger. Changes are not very large to prevent major effects on the markets but the process of making corporations larger will continue. These changes, including a gradual increase in the numbers of workers, will prevent the need for an increase in the number of corporations in general.
Countries with a very large number of corporations are harder to manage. Larger corporations will in time reduce the number of corporations that are needed in each country.
Changes must remain small to prevent major changes to employment and will continue for some time to come.

Natural Resources Corporations

Natural Resources Corporations continue to be a major source of profits to countries that build them. The profitability of these corporations continues to increase.
There are many countries with no president where many natural resources are available. These countries have a potential to become very successful.

The Cost of War

We continue the shift in the defense industry. The aim is to reduce the cost of war, both defensive and offensive.
The cost of ammunition continues to decline. In previous changes, the reduction was mainly in the defensive ammo. Changes in this upgrade include offensive ammunitions.
The cost of weapons is increasing a bit.
In total, we expect these changes to continue the decline of the cost of war. We intend to continue the trend without disturbing the defense industry which is increasingly profitable.
Defense related corporations are producing profits that are comparable to the profit of other corporations while they employ a substantially smaller number of workers which means that countries can set up more corporations with the same size of population.

The upgrade is now implemented on KB. It will be implemented before 8am EST

Andy,

I like the new layout, much simpler and easier to manage in my opinion
+1

For corporations can the GM look into Asset maintenance?
It seems to have a huge issue with over ordering and paying for products. Regularly I find myself paying 200b in loans. The corporation orders cargo shuttles and because of huge demand then will spend a massive amount in "immediate buying".

I buy at 220Q... Market price is 11B and last price paid is 31B... There is a huge discrepancy and it leads to some large problems. I am not suggesting any corp changes to supplies or anything like that, but maybe the GM can look at the purchasing or immediate cost buying.
Buying smaller cost items is not a huge deal, but when your talking about big ticket items, it can bankrupt a corp if not found fast enough.

Andy

Please check my CEO "Melcorean Producers" on LU then check "Freemont Assets Maintenance".

You can see the moment the corps cant order shuttles they stack orders. Right now they are trying to order 23 cargo shuttles. If all 23 got ordered at 220Q that would result in 557 billion, which would bankrupt the corp.

Just trying to bring it to your attention so it does not cause any bigger game issues

@user interface (usability)

Hi, I am with a Samsung S21 Ultra and I can only see up to Transportation menu. Trade menu is not available.

Regards

Myers, does this happen if you hold your phone in landscape view?

Hi Aries, yes.
Portrait = Up to Education
Landscape = Up to Transportation

A very serious menu problem.

we will resolve it ASAP.
The Corporations option is both in the menu and on the left side of the page.
The option can be removed from the menu.

Supersoldier

Some corporations become larger.
one of the reasons is that we want to reduce the fractions problem.

We have recently increased the loan limit for corporations and allow them to take much larger loans.
the increase in size is accompanied by an increase in profitability.

Cargo shuttle corporations were always nearly to large to handle. many players stayed out of it but some did build the shuttles and profits are very large.

I will increase loan limits further in the next upgrade to make it all easier.

Asset maintenance corporations and also other types of maintenance corporations are also very large and are also very profitable. Shortages are now smaller than recently but the cost of raw materials can be large.
The cash flow can be reduced by a reduction in the size of orders. You can reduce the order size measured in months production.

An increase of the loan limit will help too.
We have also increased the amount of cash that can be transferred into corporations.

I will recheck some limits and adjust to better support the increasing size of some corporations.

Andy,

Thanks for the update!
I just wanted to let you guys know so it didn't become a bigger issue.

Do corps like Defensive Weapon Maintenance make a profit now? My graphs say no..

Let me specify, enterprise-run ones, that pay for country resource use. Like this one

https://sim03.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=ccorp&miCorpNumber=1457023

Went from a $15B profit last game year to not making any money in the current one.

or this one

https://sim03.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=ccorp&miCorpNumber=276030

Which has a harsh balance sheet for not being too new a corp.

Military Base Maintenance corps look like too much trouble to be worth running too. I bet others are effected

Airforce Maintenance corps too. Check just about any of them run by an enterprise. The main problem is they are required to use so many materials, their country resource used expense is atrocious. They can't make a profit. State corps just ignore that expense.

If this is intended, say so. These corps will no longer make sense outside of running as a state corp.

Might as well add that Strategic Airport and Strategic Military Bases corps have the same problem.

I am in agreement with Aries as I am seeing the same issues.

Shuttle, Maintenance corps, and some weapons corps all have the same issues.
Some corps use so much resources on a month to month basis that when you add country resource fees they BARELY make profits.

I used my CEO on LU and looked to buy the best "Airforce maintenance" corps.
State corps all made over 1-billion monthly income, CEO's always lost or made very little (only a few million)

With that said, I would like to propose a two possible solution to the GM

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First suggestion,
The GM can consider lowering the country resource fee game wide and allowing player set tax rates to play a bigger role. However, I know historically the GM seems hesitant to that idea in order to protect new players which is understandable.

Second suggestion,
Production levels and prices game wide are doing well. The GM has made changes in employment and other areas which have had positive effects on "State corps", but have not had the same effects for "Enterprise corps".
Instead of making numerous corporations changes, what about giving CEO's corps a small percentage based production increase.

If a corporation is state owned there is no increase, however, if the corporation is owned by a "enterprise's" it gets a 5% increase to it's production.
A 5% enterprise production increase would not make a huge deal to smaller corporations as it would mean an extra 2.5-billion in revenue with most going to taxes/country resource fees for a corporation making 50-billion per year.
However, the 5% to any of the higher tier corporations would help provide "10 to 20 billion" in yearly income which would help to offset the costs and some issues we are seeing.

I don't believe any blanket changes are needed. Private and Public corps already get a higher cap to effectivity and quality upgrades over State corps that should allow them to make up the difference in paying the country resources used "tax". The problem is for the corps I mentioned, they don't. Those specific corps need a fix.

I believe a recent patch broke the maintenance corps. I believe the strategic military base/airport corps have had the issue longer. All need their fundamentals fixed, and, in particular, the military base maintenance one should be far more rewarding to run based on the difficult defensive fortifications supply requirement.

I agree that the "tax" system should be changed.

However, my perception(and some others in discord) is the GM seems to not want to for a few reasons.
Right now they are rebalancing and tweaking corp sizes at the moment, which have shown some positive results. With that said, I think their main reason is corps are increasing workforce sizes and a decrease in taxes would impact the new players much more.

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I know in Discord many people have stated income issues with a number of corps.

Robotics, certain corps with high consumption numbers(shuttles, maintenance, etc), and certain low income corps (Agriculture or food).

I do think some type of tweak needs to happen to either production or taxation. Regardless of the changes the GM makes, I will say they've been on a good streak with the changes of late so anything I can do I'm happy to help with

-I didn't say any general game system should be changed. Just the specific corps that were adversely affected to reduce the cost of war.

Military Supplies corps not doing great. Aircraft Fuel and Gasoline aren't doing all that much better. It looks like if it is a corp that supplies the military that isn't Military Services, it's fundamentals got screwed to lower country costs.

Andy, could this be addressed before we just decide to scrap all our corps, and let C3s fill up with unprofitable corps that will supply our militaries instead?

When are the maps being upgraded?

Looking forward!

Aries,

What are you seeing in the markets? I'm trying to track any issues in the hopes of giving feedback to the GM.

I've been tracking "Assets main, Def weapons main, Airforce main, Cargo shuttles, and now I've even seen military supplies showing issues".

Just wondering what you are seeing.

State corps seem fine, but CEO are still showing losses.
I do agree it seems like the country resources are sucking up a ton of profit, but it also seems like some of the corps that make a ton also see higher then normal "monthly resource costs", which drags the costs down heavily.

I think the issue was caused by pursuing reducing the cost of standing militaries. Recent game notes fluctuate between that standalone goal or combined with being more palatable versus storing weapons in enterprises.

This is why a general change to all corps shouldn't be needed. One focused on fixing the corps that were broken in pursuit of that goal is necessary.

These corps I have been watching the most closely and appear to have no current reason for players to run

Military Bases Maintenance
Airforce Maintenance
Def Weapons Maintenance
Off Weapons Maintenance
Str Weapons Maintenance
Military Supplies
Strategic Military Bases
Strategic Airports

Cargo shuttles fundamentals I don't think were affected by those specific changes. I believe they weren't originally designed as a money maker. They weren't traded on the world market and you either built them for your own use or sold them for coins. I was okay with that model, but they were added to the world market and now don't seem to make sense.

Oh, here are some of Andy's corps that fit these categories on WG:

https://sim03.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=ccorp&miCorpNumber=3883002

https://sim03.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=ccorp&miCorpNumber=5014006

https://sim03.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=ccorp&miCorpNumber=3267007

https://sim03.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=ccorp&miCorpNumber=6216050

They all either lose money or barely break even. This is with max market price. Strategic corps do very slightly better, but wouldn't be worth a corp slot in your enterprise.

Question: I have been adding weapons to my country but this month I went -593 for soldiers. Is this part of this update? Just ongoing?

I checked the news and no weapons have been destroyed. I had not been online for the previous 2 months so I didn't deactivate any weapons either.

Andy,

The GM has to do something, this is horrific!!!

I have many corps taking out 300B in loans and are still 200B in debt. An asset main corps just went 600b in total debt within 6months(24 real hours) because they are trying to rush order products.

Please the GM needs to make adjustments.

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https://sim05.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=w3graph&miTable=corphist&miKey=3464035&miColumn=vCorpTotalLoans

https://sim05.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=w3graph&miTable=corphist&miKey=3464035&miColumn=vCorpCash

Here are some other corps you can track for massive increase in loans.

I'm tracking this issue in IPO'ed "Cargo shuttle corps" and private Asset main corps.
Just providing info, hope it helps.

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https://sim05.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=w3graph&miTable=corphist&miKey=2102021&miColumn=vCorpTotalLoans

https://sim05.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=w3graph&miTable=corphist&miKey=3464893&miColumn=vCorpCash

https://sim05.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=w3graph&miTable=corphist&miKey=3464431&miColumn=vCorpCash

I gave up on them and went back to the basics.

Super, it looks like Ramon Assets Maintenance changed its ordering strategy in September. Highlighted by the fact that corp has no less than 26 cargo shuttles, a 115 month supply. In that month, it purchased nearly $500 Billion worth of supplies. I mean, sure, you can sit on $1 Trillion worth of supplies, but you have to pay for them, and that's where your cash went, and still is.

https://sim05.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=w3graph&miTable=corphist&miKey=3464035&miColumn=vCorpValueOfMaterials

Fresno too

https://sim05.simcountry.com/cgi-bin/cgi2nova?SN_ADDRESS=wwwCountry&SN_METHOD=w3graph&miTable=corphist&miKey=3464893&miColumn=vCorpValueOfMaterials

Tell us more about what your order strategy for supplies was before September, and what you changed it to. It looks like a change was made, possibly to account for the lack of SC maintenance units that your other asset corps are missing, that caused them to buy 100s of billions worth of all their supply types, including costly shuttles. I think your asset corps have more cargo shuttles than I currently own.

Aries,

This has been an ongoing issue I have pointed out to the the GM, but nothings changed.
Andy can confirm this, my strategies have been the same for a long time, I have not changed them in many REAL months. My strategies run 30 months low water and 12 month buy.

From my perspective and record keeping.
What seems to happen is corps that use high cost in demand items (bases, cargo shuttles, etc) will order them. When they are not delivered they order more and its a snowball effect. After some time of no production the corps immediate buy causing these issues.

Go back to the top of the thread and I posted about this issue 10 days ago. This seems to be a repetitive issue with some corps.