W3C - Game News Aug. 14 and Today Aug. 29

1. Crimson One

Crimson One should have started running by August 1.
Unfortunately, the number of interested players is very close to zero.
Crimson One represents a major development effort that took several months to complete and was done to answer once and for all, the requests for a place where unrestricted wars can take place.

We had long discussions on the forum about the war process and how it should be liberalized and make war possible without any protection, and back to “what is has been before�. This is now done, but interest is extremely limited.

We will keep registration open for Crimson One for a longer period and see if more players become interest. We will start it if at least 25 players are registered.
If nothing happens for two more months, we will repay those who registered their gold coins back.

2. War levels (Aug. 14)

More war levels added to Simcountry. The highest war level is now 18. We intend to add more levels in the coming weeks and months. There are very few players reaching these war levels but it should remain possible. These war levels carry large awards in gold coins and game money.

3. Population birth and Death rates

Population birth rates are too low and the population in countries with very large population numbers tend to decline. Many have asked us to improve this and we have promised to do so in several stages.

We have increased birth rates and reduced death rates in the previous upgrade on Aug. 14. The change had a good effect and the numbers are now more reasonable but as we said before, it is hard to predict what the full effect would be.

Two weeks later, the full effect is visible and we are now introducing a next stage, increasing birth rates again and reducing death rates.
Results should become visible on the birth and death rate graphs on the population page. It will kick in immediately and its effect will increase in time. We expect the full effect to become visible after one week.

4. Death Rates in General

Death rates can be reduced in every country by improving the health index. We have now increased the influence of the health index on the death numbers twice (Aug. 14 and today) and the result should be visible immediately.

Increasing the health index requires more hospitals, doctors and nurses and increases the cost for the country. It does result in much lower death numbers, keeps more workers alive and working, but it also increases the number of retired citizens and the cost of social services to support that group. The choice is yours.

5. The use of Raw Materials

We have recently added more raw materials to the production process of many products in Simcountry. The reason for these changes is that some materials are only used in the production process of only one or two products and it makes them unstable if the market for these products shows sudden changes. Corporations that depend on only very few buyers can then bankrupt very quickly.

To prevent disruptions to the production process, we have a gradual introduction process of new raw materials to existing corporations. Preventing shortages that can disrupt production.
We have done so in the past two upgrades and have increased gradually the use of the new raw materials.

This is a good improvement in stabilizing the markets and we are looking for more products that are being produced by a very small number of corporations and used by very few.

Andy,

Awesome, great to see the game news is back :D

It's good to see the GM's addressing population concerns. May I suggest that the underlining cause of the original problem was overwhelmingly on the births side of the equation.

Even with a healthcare index of only 138, my average life expectancy is already 113. That is way beyond any realistic value, ever seen in the real world. And it is impossible to sustain with a retirement age capped at 65.


The death rate largely effects ageing, rather than total long term population. Since any growth from reduced deaths, just increases the elderly population, further suppressing births.

Long term, it can actually lower your total workforce. Because the increased elderly population still counts towards total population, and as such, drives down your birth numbers, depriving you of young productive citizens.


If you are trying to enable larger populations to be sustainable. Please focus on births, not on reducing the already extremely low death rates.


Signed President of DanNation on LU

Andy,

I was doing some research around life expectancy and death rates in the real world. It turns out that the Death Rate in Simcountry isn't low at all.

Instead the game is simply over estimating life expectancy. In the real world the global death rate is below 0.9% of the population per year. This results in a average global life expectancy of just over 70.

In Simcountry, my nation has a death rate of 1.1% per year, with a life expectancy of 113. The death figures are accurate. However the life expectancy is being drastically miscalculated.

I would suggest either updating the formula for life expectancy, or hiding the value in game. Because as it stands, it's very misleading. Making people think their citizens live far longer than they actually do.

Signed President of DanNation on LU

Andy,

Please consider tweaking the average life expectancy rate. While a high healthcare index is a players choice us economic players are punished. I choose to play an economic game and I'm dramatically punished for it. You require 180 healthcare index past level 10.

I'm currently at a 190 healthcare index(please check Melichor on LU) the average life expectancy is at 172.72 years and growing! Most my empire sits at 145 healthcare at the expectancy is 120+... These index's mean I pay more in social security then they ever provide.

I'm sorry but 170+ years is WAY to long for sims to live. It makes it almost impossible to keep index's you require not to mention the healthcare and Social security dramatically drain my fiances.

Either the GM needs to update the game requirements to have massively lower index's requirements or the GM needs to put a cap in place for healthcare. I pled with you to please place a cap on life expectancy Honestly If I have people living to 100 that's fine, maybe even 110. But anything over 110 years old is insanity and just shows how desperately the GM must take action.

Everyone,

The TL;DR is... The death rate is fine. The displayed life expectancy is a miscalculation that doesn't effect actual game values, just ignore it.

Signed President of DanNation on LU

Life expectancy is incorrect.
we will find what is wrong and fix it.

In the mean time, I have seen that death rates are down a bit and birth rates up.

we will wait a week and see where it goes.
then may make another step.

Andy,

Thank you, I'm glad to hear it. Good to see some focus on the non-war side of the game. I'm looking forward to analysing the changing population demographics.

Signed President of DanNation on LU

Andy. Layout problems. Several of us have been asking about it for the past few days in Problems and General. I can only assume you are missing these posts. Please address the problem of the old layout being switched to the new one despite our preferences in settings. This is effecting everyone who chooses to, and prefers the old layout.

Thanks.

Khome,

I'm pretty sure there were previous posts from the GM. Saying that the old layout had been discontinued. And no longer received the updates it would need to remain functional. As such everyone is being move onto the new layout.

Maintaining two layout systems would require extra developer time, that could otherwise be used improving the game.

Andy, feel free to correct me if I am mistaken. However, I think this is kind of like people demanding that Facebook "bring back the old notifications system and make it great again"... It's never going to happen.

Signed President of DanNation on LU

Dan, several of us had been asking for about a week for an answer with no reply. It's unreasonable not to expect one. Also, maintaining an old layout which has been used and preferred by many is no huge concession.

The new layout is garbage. I can't even find the welfare index on the main page. I have to go into the country indexes page to find it.

I noticed that to .

I'm curious as to what the old layout looks like. I presume I am using the new layout. Too bad we don't have a choice between the two.

For one thing better PR (public relations) and responsiveness from the GM's would go along way. I think that is why quite a few players get frustrated and leave.

"Maintaining two layout systems would require extra developer time, that could otherwise be used improving the game."
Yeah, been waiting since 2008 for that..
Still waiting.
Give us the old layout back atleast..
The GMs dont take, or respond to valid criticism.
Goodluck getting one to reply, Im sure they are busy with their 9-5 jobs tho, god forbid this being their only income source..

It is frustrating....

We should be grateful for the 20 minutes per month that the gamemasters devote to the game.

Personally I am very appreciative to the GM's for making a game like Simcountry. There are very few games with deep, market, demographic, financial, and global simulation. Structured in such a realistic manner.

Sure things could always be improved, but there isn't a great line of people out there, willing to step up to do a better job.

As for cost, the game is Extremely affordable. Far more so than almost any other MMO I play. I am grateful for everything they do for us. Although I would always happily have more XD haha, but I shouldn't be greedy haha

Signed President of DanNation on LU

Life expectancy

I already confirmed that the computation of the life expectancy is wrong. I said we will find the error and fix it.

The error is corrected.
The next update next week Monday (probably) will fix it.
The change will start directly but will take a some time to stabilize, moving from the previous computation to the new one.

Birth rates

The last update did increase birth rates.
the next update will add a new boost.
we are careful about these changes as it is difficult to see where it goes.

Computations are numeric and depend on population numbers in some age groups and the total population.

The old page layout

The old page layout was indeed very old.
The current one can be easily updated, colors can be changed, choice of info on the screen, moving blocks where you want then or removing them.
It is possible to set colors to match the previous interface.

There are many pages with two versions and it is obsolete.
we said long ago, several times, that it will be phased out.

There are indeed very few players who know how these pages looked like.
For years now, new players use the new style.

Andy,

Thank you. I'm looking forward to the next round of birth rate increases, it's exciting to see new life being breathed into the demographics of our worlds :D

Signed President of DanNation on LU

About the layout, yes we know new players use the new one. That's fine. And yes, we know that "we" said that the old one would be phased out, however there are enough older players requesting that some effort be made to allow us to continue using the old layout. As stated before, it is very unattractive and even with the change of colors and arrangements, it is still not what we enjoy seeing. It don't believe it would be too much to ask that you allow the old layout be an option as it has been. It has lasted this long, I see no reason to add another reason to irritate SCs longest, and most devoted players.
Seriously, can we just catch one simple break here? There are MANY things wrong with this game that I know will fall on deaf ears, so I gave up on saying anything. However, the page layout is a VERY reasonable compromise. Please don't dig your heels in just to make a point. Please just let us have this one thing.

I find the new layout difficult to get information at a glance. It is too busy. The old layout was simple and perfect in my opinion.

Amen.

You can remove information from the layout and much reduce the info on the page.
you can also change colors.

yeah, as stated before, I am already aware of that. It's still hard on the eyes, and the request to allow us to use the old layout remains. Please do not dismiss this so quickly and give us the courtesy of a true consideration. This isn't a hard change.