Government effect on corruption: Insignificant?

[Dracleath]

I just ran a few tests on corruption, check these numbers out. This is on a tiny map, with the Japanese, using 7 cities . Kyoto and Osaka have a palace and forbidden palace respectively.
Format: government corruption total commerce percent waste total shields percent


Kyoto
Democracy 1 86 1% 1 39 3%
Communism 3 53 6% 3 37 8%
Republic 1 87 1% 1 41 2%
Monarchy 1 57 2% 1 43 2%
Despotism 1 53 2% 1 35 3%

Osaka
Democracy 2 109 2% 1 79 1%
Communism 4 73 5% 5 55 9%
Republic 2 109 2% 1 79 1%
Monarchy 1 81 1% 1 44 2%
Despotism 1 68 1% 1 63 1%

Satsuma
Democracy 7 123 6% 3 53 6%
Communism 8 83 10% 5 49 10%
Republic 7 118 6% 4 50 8%
Monarchy 6 81 7% 4 50 8%
Despotism 6 75 8% 4 50 8%

Nara
Democracy 14 94 15% 11 67 16%
Communism 11 65 17% 14 64 22%
Republic 16 90 18% 14 64 22%
Monarchy 12 64 19% 15 63 24%
Despotism 12 53 23% 13 50 26%

Edo
Democracy 17 58 29% 10 30 33%
Communism 11 36 31% 10 30 33%
Republic 21 53 40% 13 29 45%
Monarchy 13 33 39% 15 31 48%
Despotism 13 28 46% 13 27 48%

Izumo
Democracy 7 8 88% 6 7 86%
Communism 3 4 75% 7 8 86%
Republic 7 8 87% 7 8 88%
Monarchy 3 4 75% 7 8 87%
Despotism 3 4 75% 3 4 75%

Nagoya
Democracy 18 26 69% 11 14 78%
Communism 10 14 71% 10 14 71%
Republic 23 24 98% 13 14 93%
Monarchy 12 13 92% 13 14 93%
Despotism 11 12 91% 12 13 92%

Nagoya is an interesting case, so I did a couple of more tests
Nagoya w/ courthouse
Democracy 13 28 50% 8 24 57%
Communism 8 15 53% 8 14 57%
Republic 17 27 63% 10 14 71%
Monarchy 10 14 71% 10 14 71%
Despotism 10 13 77% 9 13 69%

Nagoya in democracy w/ courthouse and WLTK
13 24 58% 7 14 50% (so much for that theory)

Nagoya in democracy with factory and courthouse
17 30 56% 8 17 47%


The rates vary somewhat due to outside factors that vary from turn to turn, I tried to keep those to a minimum, though. What we mainly see here is that of all the cities in Japan, only one was largely affected by government type. Also, it appears that the best thing you can do to fight corruption is build a courthouse. If a courthouse doesn't help, nothing probably will. Finally, corruption and waste appear to decrease percentagewise as you gain more production. This needs more testing to be certain, though, it could just be an artifact of corruption and waste values rounding to the nearest integer.

[dr. blackclove]

I am also puzzled - it seems like "better" governments still lead to high corruption. Even under democracy I have cities with like 90% corruption. The most corrupt appear to be cities located on islands... I had one game where my Americans built a two city "cuba" island and a one city "Puerto Rico" island. Both had very high corruption, even with courthouses and harbors. I had been hoping that harbors and airports would somehow reduce the distance to palace and thus corruption.

It seems like other structures, maybe culture level, have some kind of effect on corruption. It could be my imagination, but it sure seems like the corruption rate went down as some of these cities built temples and cathedrals and things. Is there any basis to this or was it my imagination? What about having other cities nearby? As some of my cities spread their influence farther out, even being far from my capital, they seemed to get a little less corrupt.

[inca911]

I have been attempting to ensure that all my cities are connected within my national borders. In your testing, did you see any evidence that cities unconnected to the main empire experienced greater corruption? I have been expanding my national borders for cultural reasons, but the border theory should be easil yproven/disproven in time (of which I don't have nearly enough to do all the things I'd like to do with this game!)....

[RichM]

Does War weariness affect corruption? or the general happiness of citizens?

[Jaybe]

... Finally, corruption and waste appear to decrease percentagewise as you gain more production. ...

In my one, 8-day game, it appeared that it was either increased production or a matter of time that reduced corruption. Perhaps they are both involved.

[zapperio]

I've played 4 games on regent on a regular map with about 20 cities with the most distant cities typically around 20 squares from the capital and I've yet to see noticeable corruption (20% at most). What am I doing wrong?

I do rush build cultural and administrative improvements and my culture is consistently the richest so maybe, and I’d like to have that confirmed, culture does have an impact?

Zap

[Sten Sture]

Is their a road connection to the corruption calc? I thought I read that there would be one some time ago. If island cities are particularly succeptable that may be an issue.

Remember how in Civ2 the road connection for trade bonuses had to be via a specific and not always obvious route? Maybe the same type of bug is in force here.

[RickBlaine]

My Civ3 first game was on Warlord with a large map and I had 40-50 cities when it ended with a diplomatic victory in the 1840s. Corruption was annoying, but manageable, in some of my original cities far from the capital. But in the late industrial/early modern age, I took eliminated two civs on my continent (to prevent other civs who declared war on them from gettin a foothold on that continent). No matter what I did over several centuries--I had them connected to my empire by railroad, had all citizens happy, bought cultural improvements every turn--these cities produced only zero or one shield (I only held on to the damn things to keep other civs out). Cities I took over earlier in the game actually had decent production eventually, so I am unsure if these would have got better with time, or the distance/number of cities made these cities hopeless regardless of what I did. If you are willing to sink the time/money into these cities, I think the game should allow it to be possible to improve production/commerce beyond this.

[Wolfgang76]

Zap: What game level did you play at? Chief? Warlord? Etc...