Weapon Costs

I was wondering why weapons cost so much in the beginning of the game and now they only cost me $3-$4B per month...

I don't know what you mean by the beginning of the game.

Numbers in the game are much smaller now.

We consider the price of weapons and ammunition too high as it is and want it to decline and make war cheaper.

but the price also depends on supply and demand and can change by a factor of 3 depending on the market.

The price has no bearing on how long you've been playing the game.

In short: Its cheaper nowadays than it was for a year ago. Armies are now smaller. Weapons have gone down in price along with other goods. In total less sim$$ in costs.

In relative terms in not that sure how much cheaper its become because it goldcoin= sim$ has changed much aswell.

Part of the decline is indeed eliminated by the decline in the value of game money versus gold coins.

The decline in the cost of weapons and ammo is however more steep and will continue.
Last week it was maybe 3% down. I expect another 3% by mid May.

You need to compensate for the decline in ammo/weapon cost with the ability of the corps that make them to produce a profit Andy. I know you hope for much more use of ammo/weps but for now that is not happening.

You know the percentage of the total corps that can be built in the game that are military corps is high, this is a large market slice that you need to give a higher priority to.

The decline in pricing did not didminish the profitability at all.
In fact, the weapon and ammo industry is designed to make high profits, nearly as high as the High tech industry, and higher than all other products.

Navy weapons and ammo are even much more profitable.

The problem is overproduction and oversupply on the market.

With oversupply, the price can decline by 50% or more, the cost is not declining and the corporations make losses.

The oversupply situation can be solved by either more weapons and ammo are being sold, or some corporations will close.

we let the market do its work.

we do not give priority to any product. we have always let the market do its work and intervened to prevent major crashes, and at the start of new products, we have helped to start a market.

It is unclear to me why anyone would think that we are causing shortages or oversupply.

I have closed many weapons and ammo corps.

Very few of the ones I have left make a regular profit. There is rarely a shortage of any weapon or ammo unit, therefore their price never becomes high and the corps rarely do well.

I do not mean to imply you cause any shortage or oversupply, I just think that your reductions are too harsh or maybe too sudden for this market to balance itself. Perhaps remove weapon and ammo corps from the C3 portfolio? I dont know, just my thinking on it.

What I meant was when I began in the game, Weapons costed alot for me. Now they hardly make a dent in my Cash

I understand now. They prices went down because they werent selling.

what I don't understand is how the weapons corps produce so little each month yet there are huge oversupplies.... we need less restrictions and more war (larger player base would help aswell) and maybe C3s need to not have so many corps?

We have looked into the current status of weapons and ammunition it in the past several days.
It seems that the oversupply of weapons is continueing, although numbers are smaller than before.
Part is due to selling by players.

Many types of ammunition are now in short supply and some are really deep in the red.
more corporations are constructed but the shortages are too high.

as to profitability:
in cases of short supply, profitability is excellent. in cases of oversupply, these corporations do not make any profit and may disappear.

A closer look into all these products will quickly reveal what is the right thing to do.

In the next upgrade, probably May 21, we will:

1. Continue the slow fall in prices of ammunition. The reduction will be larger this time as production numbers will increase a bit.
The profitability of the corporations will remain unchanged. It will depend as usual, on the welfare index, quality, market etc.

2. Weapons cost will probably remain unchanged, or slightly lower, but production numbers may decline a bit. At some point, we hope that the market will stabilize.

also here, the change in structure will not change the potential profitability. Lower numbers may improve the market and increase profitability.

structural changes are rare and necessary in this case to allow for the price of ammunition and weapons to decline over time while preserving their profitability.

we were asked to support the weapons market by purchasing products and taking them out. We never intervene in this way.

It does not improve the situation. Such purchases trigger the automatic creation of more corporations and the problem returns.