Starting Nation economic strength

[Nobody]

You want to keep the old income-function?

It works, and no player has screamed "its broken". Also, per here, that part of the rules is not up for discution anymore. I am fine with tweaking (and want to) the way growth works within the system, but I feel that modifications to the system beyond that count as wholesale change of the system and would unnecessarily delay the start of the game.

Actually is was part of the problem (once you ran out of populations ICs were only repaying after 38 years), but our modifications have hopefully fixed that.
I will run some test tomorrow concerning the effect of regional vs global IC costs.

[snip]

Regional vs global IC costs fall under the modification of growth, which is something that is changeable, and something I want changed as well from the standpoint of a player. I really like the system that has come to the front so far in this thread and others and look forward to numbers that we can discuss. Thank you for taking the lead on this.

[snip]

OK, seeing as there was no big uproar over the UK number, I put together a very rough list of what the economics of each nation would look like.

Nation	Income	BP
United Kingdom	315	81
Germany	299.25	68
United States	283.5	65
France	275.625	60
Italy	142.4	23
Russia	160	19
Japan	150	22
Austria-Hungary	128	18
Spain	128	13.5
Netherlands	140	14
Ottomans	96	13.5

Now...*puts on asbestos undies and flack-jacket* Thoughts on these?

[Darman]

looks okay to me.  Now for the REALLY important numbers... starting numbers...

[Delta Force]

I think that the Russians and Austro-Hungarians need more income and BP. Keep in mind Russia has the 3rd largest navy in the world at this time and most of the ships were built in Russian shipyards (with armor, guns, and sometimes engines being imported). The Austro-Hungarians also have a larger economy than the Italians and more industry (although obviously not as much naval industry), seeing as Italy is also more powerful in this timeline they should be relatively equal. The Ottomans also seem to be a bit too industrialized (should be able to build a few torpedo boats and destroyers each year but not much more).

[Tanthalas]

Russia has the 3rd largest navy in the world at this time and most of the ships were built in Russian shipyards (with armor, guns, and sometimes engines being imported).

I trimed your quote down to the part that realy matterd.  So basicly Russia could build alot of ships but had to import everything that made them warships.  You might have noticed while Italia has more BP Russia has more cash, thus alowing you to import guns armor and engines (isnt that realy more or less the whole ship?).

[KWorld]

Russia has the 3rd largest navy in the world at this time and most of the ships were built in Russian shipyards (with armor, guns, and sometimes engines being imported).

I trimed your quote down to the part that realy matterd.  So basicly Russia could build alot of ships but had to import everything that made them warships.  You might have noticed while Italia has more BP Russia has more cash, thus alowing you to import guns armor and engines (isnt that realy more or less the whole ship?).

Now, now, you're overstating the case a bit here.  Imperial Russia could build everything it needed for warships, except steam turbines, and certainly would have acquired the ability to produce steam turbines without WWI and the Russian Revolution.  At times they purchased abroad because they needed more than what domestic industry could produce (just like the Italians ordering 12" guns from the UK) in a timely fashion, at others they purchased from abroad because domestic industry hadn't yet acquired the ability to make a particular item (like turbines, or Harvey-process armor for some of the mid-1890s ships).  That's not much different from most countries (even the UK purchased armor plate from the Czechs in the late 1930s).

[KWorld]

On the issue of Russia being the 3rd largest navy at this time period: it's certainly true, but it's also partially because neither Germany nor the US got serious about their navies until the 1890s and the early 1900s.  The current numbers appear to allow Russia to be the 3rd strongest navy (assuming a similar history by the US and Germany), and would certainly allow an alliance between France and Russia to challenge the UK.

[Darman]

If you wanted to balance that region a little more:

Maybe take 1.5BP away from the Ottomans and give them $4 income? 

Then give Austro-Hungary 2BP to bring her a little closer to Italy BP-wise (still 3 less than Italy but its not 5) and another $5 or so.  So they are a little more balanced. 

[Tanthalas]

The Otoman numbers im all for, i'll take everyone elses word on their ability (personaly I would give them nothing as I hate large parts of their teritory but thats just personal bias).  Simply basing off what was produced ship wise, AH should be roughly 3/4 Italy (they produced 9 "battleships" to the 12 built by Italy pre dreadnaught OTL).  Basing on that 18 is about right (I actualy thought it would give them more before I just did the math).  as to the more cash I cant realy coment but I could see the boost.

If you wanted to balance that region a little more:

Maybe take 1.5BP away from the Ottomans and give them $4 income? 

Then give Austro-Hungary 2BP to bring her a little closer to Italy BP-wise (still 3 less than Italy but its not 5) and another $5 or so.  So they are a little more balanced.

[snip]

If you wanted to balance that region a little more:

Maybe take 1.5BP away from the Ottomans and give them $4 income? 

Then give Austro-Hungary 2BP to bring her a little closer to Italy BP-wise (still 3 less than Italy but its not 5) and another $5 or so.  So they are a little more balanced.

Seems good to me.

[Desertfox]

I wouldn't mind having a little more cash.

[Tanthalas]

Ok based on the numbers snip presented above, and after some rather extensive testing I have come up with the folowing proposal.  For startup each Nation would recive a 5 year (10 turn) backdate of income to be spent on well everything that makes the sim playable excluding IC and BP (BP is a duh its in the list, and IC should be figurable from your cash alotment).  Basicly all you need to do is take your cash and BP multiply it by 10 and go to town buying stuff.  To make this easier I have made up the simple spreadsheat atached.  Dont type in the gray squares as these are either automaticly figured or set values.

[KWorld]

Gah.  I suppose I'd best coordinate a little bit with my Iberian counterpart, so the Iberian-American war remains plausible.  I'm gonna have lots of SOMETHING, that's for sure.

[Tanthalas]

Gah.  I suppose I'd best coordinate a little bit with my Iberian counterpart, so the Iberian-American war remains plausible.  I'm gonna have lots of SOMETHING, that's for sure.

once you start in on ports, slips, dry docks, and army it actualy goes faster than you think... I actualy ended up with a sizeable chunk of pure cash left over.  Im working on a proposal for that but it is outside the discusions snip and I had already had so im waiting for him to say yes or no before I advance it any further.  as it stands Italia will likley only have around 20 cruisers and 6 battleships for startup.