Corruption Levels Are Fair

[coriander]

Just an observation, but I've noticed that as people have had more time to actually play the game, rather than complain about it, most of them have decided that the level of corruption and waste in Civ 3 isn't unfair, it's just different from what we were used to with Civ 2 and SMAC. So you have to develop new strategies, is that a bad thing? I was shocked at first by how corrupt my distant cities were (what, my people would dare to cheat their beloved ruler?), but I found ways to manage that, and I came to accept the reality that managing a far-flung empire isn't as trivial as it was in Civ 2. Civ 3 makes you think a little more. At some point you have to go for quality rather than quantity.

The developers have said that the AI labors under the same burden of corruption as the player does. So again, it's not unfair, just different. There are those who think of "fair" as "balanced in my favor". To put this in perspective, I found this quote from Soren about balanced combat pretty interesting:

"The AI get NO combat bonuses of any kind at any difficulty level. I understand that many people have a hard time believe this but let me give an anecdote... at one point in the project, people complained that combat was unfair, so I said I would change some things, and what I did was give the _human_ a combat bonus. Then people told me that combat was once again "fair." It is all in the eye of the beholder ."

As someone who has been playing this game now for many many hours, I've seen my attitude change from shocked dismay to gradual, grudging appreciation for the intent behind higher corruption and waste levels. You can't just turn your brain off and win this game like you could with Civ 2. I would like to see more improvement with the higher government types, but Firaxis is already working on some kind of adjustment and maybe that's in the works.

Who else has logged a lot of Civ 3 hours and gradually come to the same conclusion?

[Venger]

Firaxis has said corruption levels would be modified in a patch. So, that means either:

1) Even they recognize corruption is out of hand

2) They will break the game and you will not apply the patch

Which answer do you think best suits the situation?

Venger

[Deathray]

Well, I'm with you. I personally have yet to suffer major corruption problems. It makes long range wars harder and stuff. Hard to explain, but I like the corruption high.

[Ralf]

Originally posted by Venger
Firaxis has said corruption levels would be modified in a patch.

A Firaxian (I dont remember which one) have said that they probably will modify the corruption-levels somewhat. IF they do, we are talking small adjustments in order to avoid "1 shield output out of 10 shield wasted" situations. In above example, I suspect that they would change it to a minimum of 2-3 shields output, out of 7-8 wasted.

Anyway, I think its a better idea to leave the corruption-levels as they are, and instead concentrate on making the corruption-preventing courthouse-improvement somewhat more effective instead.

[player1]

I always though that best solution is to have every city at lest 30% (including WLTKD) of production regardless of distance & num. of cities.
Commerce corruption should stay as it is.

That way, you have an STRATEGIC DECISION:
-play big, warlike, poor economic civ with lots of units
-play smaller civ, with less units & much better techs

I also think that if someone expands to much, he should start stagnating in science compared to smaller (but developed) civs.
Of course he will still have large production because of nubmer of cities and that 30% production.
That way he can destroy those small tech-civs, with pure force.

[Blaupanzer]

It is possible to adjust to the level of corruption, which probably reflects historical accuracy to a degree, especially before the modern age. However, the inability to do anything to respond is very frustrating. For example in current game at Regent on large map, have a city with potential output of 6 shields, 14 gold, and growing, but only getting 1 and 1 shield/gold. Built courthouse while at peace in democracy. Citizens are three original foreigners and three of my own, divided into one entertainer, 3 happy, 2 content. Courthouse had ZERO effect. Still at 1 and 1. Now what? While the city is inland on another continent and as far from my capital as it can get, it is connected by rail to a harbor in modern times and has a 4 unit garrison. This level of negative algorithms needs to be fixed.

[Chronus]

I was a little surprised myself (even though I had advanced warning from the forum) but the more I play, the more I get used to it and actually like it. I guess it's because the waste factor is somewhat offset by the fact that you can now mine grasslands to get an extra shield (without changing it into a forest).

[GePap]

In my games, the problem of corruption has notbeen terrible since I usually have a very rich core that can afford to upkeep those economically worthless outer cities. That said, the corruption in theory is out of hand without a possible remedy. Can any of those that say- corruption is just fine- give me an example of sucha situation anywhere, anytime? As a governor I should be able, through my own administrators (the courthouse) or through terror and intimidation (not modelled in civ) milk any city, distant or otherwise, of everything they got. If you really want to make it realistic, then give a player the ability to curb corruption and waste but substitute in a happiness penalty, since the locals are probably not thrilled with all the rules coming from the distant capitol. i would rather have to keep a constant, weary eye towards a far-flung colony than decide not to make them cause, besides resources, I get nothing from them.

[Libertarian]

It doesn't bother me. I believe I recall Soren saying only that they wouldn't increase it.

[narmox]

Originally posted by Venger
Firaxis has said corruption levels would be modified in a patch. So, that means either:

1) Even they recognize corruption is out of hand

2) They will break the game and you will not apply the patch

Which answer do you think best suits the situation?

Venger

3) Firaxis has decided to heed the minority of whiners to make them happy

[Ming]

They could make everybody happy and allow you to choose different levels of corruption in the set up screens at the beginning of the game

[Dienstag]

Ah, the ubiquitous "make it an option at startup" comment. How did we forget about that!?

That would be great. I personally can't see how anyone could like the current corruption scheme, but that's fine with me.

probably been asked before somewhere, but corruption take account of the map size? I'd hate to play the US on a huge map and have everything west of Pittsburgh be totally corrupt (or would that be unrealistic?).

[Master Marcus]

I also like the high levels of corruption, and I'll read carefully what's in the first patch before dowloading it. Whatever they do in it, especially reducing the corruption, I'm afraid this will render the game easier unless they teach the AI to use the fixes as well as the average human player can do - which I doubt of course. Civ III is well balanced and I don't want that broken. The most urgent fixes to do are interface and windows related.

[TCO]

Originally posted by Ming
They could make everybody happy and allow you to choose different levels of corruption in the set up screens at the beginning of the game

And where would the default sclaer go? And where would you play, Ming?

Raging hordes, diety, max corruption?

BTW, did you start this game at diety as you promised us so often? And stay there?

Best wishes and all that.

[pg]

my main gripe about corruption is not how bad it can get but that the model used to determine it feels like a cop out. distance and number of cities are the two main things used afaik. it seems a bit simple, eh? i wouldn't mind making efficient large empires managable given certain circumstances(it'd be hard of course). you'd also have the other end of the scale which would be small empires being very corrupt.

i haven't heard this idea anywhere, but what if higher culture lowered corruption? sounds very good to me.

[Gatekeeper]

Everyone:

I get the impression that if Firaxian corruption models were applied to the United States IRL, Hawaii would be a haven for corrupt officials and people instead of a vacation destination.

CYBERAmazon

[kolpo]

i haven't heard this idea anywhere, but what if higher culture lowered corruption? sounds very good to me.

Isn't very realistic, Italy has lot's of culture but that doesn't mean that it's corruption is low

[pg]

realism isn't really the point. fun is. right now culture is not really that helpful(unless you are going for culture victory), and corruption can be a bit extreme. tying corruption and culture could be cool and useful way to improve gameplay while allowing the gameplay to be more diverse. at least that is how i see.

[Akaoz]

[Akka]

This corruption thing is in my opinion completely nuts. You can play with it, yes, and it's not "unfair" as the AI has the same penalty. But well, first it does not make any sense. Or if it does, you would have to accept that 90 % of USA is corrupted so much that it can virtually produce nothing, while Cuba suffer no corruption.
I can understand a big level of corruption in the dark age, where communications were slow (and even in this case, nothing more than 80 % corruption at most), but not in a modern time where you can reach whatever place in the world in less than a day.
Having a 1 shield 1 commerce city means that Los Angeles should produce less than a 10 000 people little town under Boston. Just plainly insane.

3) Firaxis has decided to heed the minority of whiners to make them happy

Better be a whiner than a chest banger, whose only argument is "if you think something is not well done then you're a pathetic whiner".

Originally posted by Akaoz

Very constructive and interesting. No, really.

[star mouse]

Corruption should be reduced, sure. But what I would like to see would be a distance factor in the happiness of the people. People would be unhappy about being a long way from the centre of administration. The extra entertainers that would be necessary to eliminate this extra unhappiness would have a similar effect as corruption.

[Ludwig]

Gepap, in response to your request for an example, I will make the somewhat broad observation that at no point in time in Man's roughly 10,000 year history and prehistory has anyone succeeded in conquering the world.

Large empires don't work.

Large ENDURING empires don't exist and have never existed. They fall.

Empires that are remembered for being large and enduring generally weren't. Look at the political and economic history of what is called the "Roman Empire" and count up the number of civil wars, usurpations, multiple emperors, etc. The very largest empires have been the most ephemeral. Power in the Mongol empire devolved to the periphery in a matter of decades. Hitler and Napoleon lost their marbles in timeframes you can measure in months. The British Empire did a bit better - it lasted the equivalent of 15 or 20 civ turns instead of 1 or 2.

Things fall apart. The center cannot hold. Or, in CivIII, your center better be damn good, because that's all you've got to work with if you want to kick everyone else's butt. The territories you take you're taking for one reason only: to deny them to the enemy. But that's a good reason, and if you do enough of it the other side falls apart like a house of cards. Who need production out of outlying cities? As long as I'm taking resources and production away from the AI I feel like I'm making progress.

Conquering the world by military force or by domination should be HARD. I should face resistance by subject nationalities. I should take lots of casualties. I should face a disgruntled peace party in the heartland.

Something needed to be done in the Civ series to make maintenance of large systems more challenging if the game was going to be anything but a yawn-fest. The corruption system does that a little. I actually think a greater chance of outlying cities rising in revolt would be a good device, too - outer areas should require pacification once in a while, WLTKD or no.

[Zylka]

Originally posted by coriander
Just an observation, but I've noticed that as people have had more time to actually play the game, rather than complain about it, most of them have decided that the level of corruption and waste in Civ 3 isn't unfair, it's just different from what we were used to with Civ 2 and SMAC.

The developers have said that the AI labors under the same burden of corruption as the player does. So again, it's not unfair, just different. There are those who think of "fair" as "balanced in my favor".

People are not complaining about it being "unfair", they are complaining about it not being realistic. Now please answer Vengers post, and/or leave.

[Zylka]

Originally posted by narmox


3) Firaxis has decided to heed the minority of whiners to make them happy

Funny, we have yet another contender for the thread moron crown. Firaxis botched the corruption model quite badly, they are changing it because it is not at all realistic and doesn't even work the way it is intended. It very well could have been a list minute forced handicap to fix over-production; havoc for the initially planned gameplay timeline.

If you're not a "minority whiner", then you won't download the patch as the changes "aren't needed".

Bye.

[TCO]

Maybe we need a corruption scaler. The friggen masochists can set it at "raging thieves" and the whiners (OK. OK. the realists ) can set it at "village corruption". Would that make everybody happy?

[GePap]

Ludwig:
Yes, big empire do not hold and the larger the empire the more difficult to hold, but the current corruption system is not the way to model such an event. These large empires were not broguht down complately by corruption, and corruption existed everywhere (the idea that cpatiols are not corrupt is foolish). They were brough down by the massive cost of ever continueing campaigns, outside attack, and internal revolts. As I said, you should be able, as a governor, to try to squeeze hard and get all you can from the colony, and be able to successfully do so, at the risk of revolt by the colonies (and I don't mean this screwy defection scheme). As is, the model in civ3 is not one of resistence but of your local officals not doing much. In this Game, you can still conquer the entire damn world, just raze what you don't want, kill the rest through forced labor or staarvation. The corruption system does not make conquering the world harder, it makes conquering a world with people outside your own cities harder, and how realistic is that?

[Smash]

The more i play,the less i like this game.
Its ok..but thats it.
My current monarch level republic is losing 491 of 806.But that has little to do with the fun level of this game.
maybe I should rush a factory for that 2nd sheild

A mark of a great game is replayabilty.I can't see myself still playing this game in 5 years like civ2.
Customization and scenarios aren't going to hold me either..since there is none.
Mp,if they ever have it,will be a nightmare
If I make a mod..I may get sued

[Zylka]

Originally posted by Smash

If I make a mod..I may get sued

What do you mean by that? Sarcastic?

[Smash]

yes..at least i hope so.

but think about it,if i make a Swahili or a Latin mod where i just change languages.....do i infringe?

[LaRusso]

Originally posted by Venger
Firaxis has said corruption levels would be modified in a patch. So, that means either:

1) Even they recognize corruption is out of hand

2) They will break the game and you will not apply the patch

Which answer do you think best suits the situation?

Venger

they gave in to the pressure to the likes of you who spent their whole 3 weeks whining.