N4 Economic Outline (Not Finished)

[snip]

A question for those opposing a more complex or simulation system:
Would you be ok with more complex internas if they were a "black box", aka a program or excel sheet were you copy in some data in from the last year, make a few choices (Tax rate, investments) add upkeep, trade & construction and then get some data out (carry over for the next year, tax balance...)?

That would help matters for geting new players up to speed

[miketr]

No one is going to have any problem with people making use of tools like excel.

Michael

[snip]

So is there/would be a pre-made tool (or excel file) for all of this, or would the burden be on each player to make there own?

[Darman]

So is there/would be a pre-made tool (or excel file) for all of this, or would the burden be on each player to make there own?

I picked up a spreadsheet from someone when I started.  Since then its always been fairly simple, plug the numbers in that change, and get everything balanced.  I'm guessing (hoping) that someone would make an excel sheet and share it. 

[snip]

I did the same thing, just wondering if it will be available again.

[miketr]

Once we have the rules finalized either one of us will do it or I expect one of the players will.  If a player does and everyone likes it I expect that would be a good reason to provide a in game bonus in way of reward.


Michael

[Nobody]

I'm likely going to do one - unless someone else is faster. However, I would like to see true formulae as much as possible because fiddling with look-up-tables in excel is ugly (or I don't know how to do it right).

[Delta Force]

Having done that before with games that I have made and played, I would have to say that it was the one thing that I didn't like about them. Even if it can be done in Excel and you just have to tinker with a few numbers, it is still just the most boring thing to do. We should try to keep it as simple and fast to do as possible.

Now you have lost me. I mean, there is absolutely no way around some kind of economic system, a budget, cost of construction, upkeep, import and export.

Well, in one of the games that I made things like money, food, oil, minerals, luxuries, and military equipment were all kept track of, and then there were many other variables to affect things. Now I just use GDP (and GDP growth), government revenues as a percentage of that GDP, fixed government spending (things such as running the government, healthcare in nations with it, etc.), and military spending. Of course, the new game I am working on right now is in 1860 and thus some issues such as inflation are not really a major factor, and monetary policy is also somewhat different from modern times.

If you are playing the government, then the only things that really matter are spending and income and your interactions with the private economy. Those interactions are usually through monetary policy, tariffs and trade, subsidies, and government purchases of private goods. You can't really make a calculator to simulate some of these things, and at some point you need to have human judgement to determine effects (Admins).

The way I see it, in an 1880s game (for nations using the gold standard), all you really need to keep track of economically is:

GDP
GDP growth
Government revenues (can be broken down into corporate, personal if a nation has them, import tariffs, export tariffs if a nation has them, excise taxes, etc., or just calculated as a percent of GDP)
Government expenditures (not mandatory spending the way it is referred to nowadays as in social security and healthcare, unless a country has those, but things like running the courts, paying government employees, subsidies, etc. It's essentially mandatory if you want to have the government continue functioning)
Military upkeep
Discretionary spending (not really the way it is referred to nowadays, but government spending beyond basic upkeep like buying a new dreadnought, starting a public works program, etc.)
Government debts
Government interest payments

Now, using a more real world economic system has the advantage of being as complex as you want to make it. In most cases you can just leave the economics alone, and nothing disastrous will come of it. But if you want to start tinkering around with things like taxes, subsidies, etc. you can do that. I'd much prefer having complexity be based on real world economics than on rather arbitrary rules or overly complex simulations of the private economy (since we're playing the government as opposed to industry).

[Nobody]

Well that does sound like something I want - the possibility to fiddle with some (but not to many) details, but no need for it if I don't want to bother with it.

[Kaiser Kirk]

Note Worthy Changes

1) We use normal displacement not light

2) Corps have flat upkeeps for all generations, also since army units don't have bases or the like their upkeep is very high compared to naval units.  There is some debate on this point as some people think it needs to be lower.

3) Dry Docks, Ports and Slipways now have upkeeps.

1)Why the change in displacement?  I thought the logic of not forcing people to pay extra for large void spaces made sense.

2)Corps should have a relatively flat upkeep - food and pay wouldn't vary a ton. However, equipment and it's maintenance & training will vary, so there should be a gradual increase in costs.

As for bases, in this time frame most will be in regimental bases with armories, with low technical skills and training. Per person, they should cost less than ships crew that includes more trained gunners and engineers.

A ship docked not only needs maintenance to keep from rusting, but training to keep the crew decent and barracks to house them. The same # men in the infantry can live in the same barracks, get the same pay, but don't need the same level of training and there is no slowly rusting ship.

I've already made my opinions on the cash-only concept clear.

[Sachmle]

I was thinking the other day, why not pay for "Full Tonnage" as build cost? This would simulate paying for the fuel that fills the bunkers, the shells and powder in the magazines, the food and stores on board, and other whatnots needed to make the ship useful. Then pay on either normal or standard for upkeep purposes. This would cover refueling, replacing old shells/powder, restocking used supplies, etc.

[Kaiser Kirk]

Conceptually I'd say those elements are covered by "maintenance".

At the time of the initial build you'd need to fill the magazines and bunkers... but while shells do cost and require machining, coal or oil is going to be far cheaper than quality installed steel by weight. I'm fine with not including that.  So curious as to why shifting to normal tonnage.

[Logi]

So are we decided on this system?

[ctwaterman]

First we have to finish organizing the "Proposal" so that people can see what it is they will be playing with.   This involves organizing the whole thing from the pages and pages of discussions, discarded Idea's and such.

Then once the proposal is organized it will be posted here for people to read, digest, and complain about. 

Then a poll will be taken to see how many people are willing to play with the system proposed.  Honestly many of the arguements in these open pages are things that were discussed and then either discarded or adopted in the N4 Discussions.

An example:  People are concerned about having to pay maintenance on Ports, Ship Yards and Slips and on the Ships.   But in the abstract all this maintenance is representing is the upkeep cost on the Armor Rolling Mills, Barrel Mills, Dry Docks, Slips, Harbors and all the other Infrastructure and work force that goes into the ability to create ships, there armor, guns, shells, torpedoes or whatever.  Your buying the Infrastructure by building a Military Port with facilities to support ships and by Slips and Dry Docks to build them.   Now you pay maintenance on them to discourage you from building huge amounts more then you need and as a limiting factor on ship building capacity.

[snip]

Is there an ETA on when the "official" proposal will be made? or is it still to soon to say?