Possible /housing switch

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Lord Brazen
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Possible /housing switch

Postby Lord Brazen » Sat Sep 03, 2005 7:42 pm

I have been giving some thought to the issues surrounding 1 pop housing and I agree with most that it is unrealistic. I could probably code a switch that changes the planetary population growth rate.

Getting rid of 1 pop housing would change the game significantly. It may even speed up the game on Kali as people would be moving population around less frequently.

Also, I think it would make the AI more of a challenge as they do not exploit 1 pop housing currently. They tend to just let the population grow and they dont move the population around.

My thoughts are that population growth should be greater when the planets population is greater. I would be logical that a higher population would result in more babies. Of course overpopulation would have an effect on this growth rate as well. Perhaps maximum growth rate should occur when the planet is half full.

Anyone have any suggestions?

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Cabman
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Postby Cabman » Sun Sep 04, 2005 1:24 pm

It is like u said. Max popgrowth is when a planet is half-filled.... Disabling a "housing" button will solve the issue :)

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ALEX|D
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Postby ALEX|D » Sun Sep 04, 2005 2:55 pm

What we have now:
Housing works much better with 1 or 2 POP than with 10 POP.
The BasicPOPgrowth is on max, when a Planet is half full / half filled.

The main Problem we have imo is, that housing works with 1-2 POP too well.
If we decrease the housing´s strength and increase the basic growth, we simply r able solve that problem well.

So we just need 2 switches for housing and for basicgrowth
If switch is not used its:
housing=100 (value in %)
basicgrowth=100 (value in %)

So if u want to half housing power and double basicgrowth set switches to
housing=50 (value in %)
basicgrowth=200value in %)

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dirt-bag
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Postby dirt-bag » Fri Sep 09, 2005 4:29 pm

i think the real problem with 1 pop housing occurs after autofactories and robominers...

we played some games with housing banned, +pop was sure a popular pick! pissing with the formula isnt a can of worms i'd want to open, the only way to make it remotely workable it wouldnt be worth housing...

i think the ruling we applied was no housing on any planet with any building other than marine barracks. this let u pop 1 or 2 guys on a system before building stuff.

so if u really wanted to mess with the formula, i would recommend only using unadjusted production from pop on planet (driods excluded) and deleting the prod from other sources.



i know i would certainly use a /housing switch.
bok bok

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Lord Brazen
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Postby Lord Brazen » Fri Sep 09, 2005 9:12 pm

It is like u said. Max popgrowth is when a planet is half-filled.... Disabling a "housing" button will solve the issue :)
Well, disabling it is one option and fairly easy to impliment. I'm not sure I want to eliminate housing entirely though. I would prefer something a little different.

The manual says "Housing orders the workers to build additional living space. This increases the population growth rate of the colony slightly". The problem is that is does not increase it slightly. Especially with 1 pop housing.

The real underlying problem is that the first worker making housing generates a huge increase in pop growth but additional workers increase the growth only a little. To make the problem worst, the growth penalty resulting when there is more than one poputlation is to much. These things encourage only one worker and one population.

Maybe housing should result in a flat rate increase per worker. Maybe +5% per worker. The first worker should add nearly the same as the 2nd worker. Probably, the effects of moral/polution should be worked in. Also, overpopulation should be factored in but only if the planet is nearing the maximum. Overpopulation should have no impact if the planet is less than 80% full.

I could certainly make a /nohousing switch but would prefer to change the formulas a little....
"Stars are holes in the sky from which the light of the Infinite shine through." - Confucius.

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siron
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Postby siron » Fri Sep 09, 2005 9:50 pm

I agree with LB here in many, many points. I'll write soon some details on my blog.

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Postby dirt-bag » Wed Sep 14, 2005 5:12 pm

yes, i agree with him also, however i think u will find that people wont use housing (post robos) if they lose all that prod from robos and autofacs. which is fine with me...
bok bok

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Thrawn
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Postby Thrawn » Thu Sep 15, 2005 12:56 pm

Wouldn't something along the general lines of a bell curve be the best answer to this problem? The population growth would scale up and the majority would happen during the middle of the planits growth cycle.

Some sort of adjustment to how housing works in with that would also be needed. Maybe something like insted of housing being a all or nothing propasition like it is now it could be a percentage of production that stops being useful beyond some certan point.

Image
Image of a bell curve

As I see it since you start with population you allready start beyond the really small part od the curve and the last end bit should actualy be beyond the worlds max population so that it never stops growing but it is so slow it never gets anywhere.

Sadly I get the fealing that it would be far too hard to program and all.
I'm geting far too complex but I'm sure it can be improved and even a simple housing switch will help I think.

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siron
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Postby siron » Thu Sep 22, 2005 3:42 am

I wrote a detailed post on my blog where I tried to explain the current problems.

@LB
It may even speed up the game on Kali as people would be moving population around less frequently.
I guess, at first it will be a bit slower. Different gameplay. You have to think about a new strategy.
They tend to just let the population grow and they dont move the population around.
Do you know a way to hex edit the save that we can watch the AI decisions? So far, I am not sure about the details here.
My thoughts are that population growth should be greater when the planets population is greater. I would be logical that a higher population would result in more babies. Of course overpopulation would have an effect on this growth rate as well. Perhaps maximum growth rate should occur when the planet is half full.
I have some example in my post. Be aware that I differ between "growth" and "growth rate".
Well, disabling it is one option and fairly easy to impliment. I'm not sure I want to eliminate housing entirely though. I would prefer something a little different.
I agree.
The real underlying problem is that the first worker making housing generates a huge increase in pop growth but additional workers increase the growth only a little.
I agree. Thats why the fixed prod should be excluded from the housing formula (details in my post).
To make the problem worst, the growth penalty resulting when there is more than one poputlation is to much. These things encourage only one worker and one population.
I agree. Removing POPagg in the housing formula should help here. (see example in the post)
Maybe housing should result in a flat rate increase per worker. Maybe +5% per worker. The first worker should add nearly the same as the 2nd worker.
I have such example. See equation IVc in my post.
Probably, the effects of moral/polution should be worked in. Also, overpopulation should be factored in but only if the planet is nearing the maximum. Overpopulation should have no impact if the planet is less than 80% full.
Some of these effects are already represented in the basic growth which is multiplied with the housing bonus. When you want to emphasize such effects I would propose an a value of 0.5 (or similar) in equation (IVd).

@Alex D
The main Problem we have imo is, that housing works with 1-2 POP too well.
If we decrease the housing´s strength and increase the basic growth, we simply r able solve that problem well.
I also agree. I propose some parameters at the end of my post. You have a lot of options to test different housing/basic growth combinations then.

@dirt-bag
yes, i agree with him also, however i think u will find that people wont use housing (post robos) if they lose all that prod from robos and autofacs.
When we introduce a new formula we should analyze the ratio (produced pop by housing)/(invested prod). I think we could find good parameters.


@Thrawn
Wouldn't something along the general lines of a bell curve be the best answer to this problem?
Hmm. When you cut of the tails the basic growth could look very similar to such bell curve. I am not sure that the growth function (with housing) should look similar to such curve. Housing with more than half of the pop would be inefficient for sure then.

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Postby Dog of Justice » Sun Jan 07, 2007 1:36 am

Population growth is best described by a logistic curve, not a bell curve. Natural population growth in MOO2 roughly follows this; it could be tweaked to be more faithful to the mathematical formula, but that's not a big deal.

As for housing, I'd say that the game designers were onto the right idea the FIRST time they implemented the concept (in Master of Magic), where housing just increased your base population growth by up to ~100% depending on what fraction of your population was assigned to industry. A simple variant of this should work just fine for MOO2. 1 population housing colonies will still deliver the best growth %, but the absolute growth will be a lot higher with a few more population points, so it will no longer be obvious what the optimal size of a housing colony is.

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Postby siron » Sun Jan 07, 2007 9:05 am

Population growth is best described by a logistic curve, not a bell curve. Natural population growth in MOO2 roughly follows this; it could be tweaked to be more faithful to the mathematical formula, but that's not a big deal.
The logistic curve represents the population size (for a given time t) and not the population growth. The population growth is the first derivative of this logistic curve (i.e dP/dt) and Thrawn had IMO in mind to plot a graph of the population growth in dependence of the P/K ratio (see the notation of the Verhulst equation in your link). The Verhulst equation has the well known result that the maximum population growth appears exactly with P=K/2. Therefore it looks "somehow" similar like a bellcurve which is centered at K/2.
As for housing, I'd say that the game designers were onto the right idea the FIRST time they implemented the concept (in Master of Magic), where housing just increased your base population growth by up to ~100% depending on what fraction of your population was assigned to industry. A simple variant of this should work just fine for MOO2. 1 population housing colonies will still deliver the best growth %, but the absolute growth will be a lot higher with a few more population points, so it will no longer be obvious what the optimal size of a housing colony is.
I don't know the MOM formula but the MOO2 housing bonus is in fact related to the population growth rate (i.e. the population growth divided by P). The population growth rate is monotonically declining in the MOO2 model and AFAIK thats also true for models based on the Verhulst equation. A significant housing bonus therefore strongly favors the 1pop housing solution. A new balance between housing bonus and basic growth (proposed by ALEX|D) could reduce the problem.

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Postby lord_azmodan » Mon Jan 08, 2007 10:27 am

Why not making housing similar to spys???

... Just pay a fixed price to get a population unit!!!

If you spend a fixed amount to get a Colony Base or a Colony Ship and this INCLUDES an additional population, you could expect the same for housing.

You pay 200 for a Colony Base and therefore a free pop on the new planet, so it would be balanced enough to pay 100 for an extra pop on the same planet.

Multiple worker would reduce the building time as usual and normal Pollution would limit the effectiveness for too many workers at the same time.

This means a Cloning Center would produce 10 PP per round automatically used for housing.

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Postby siron » Wed Jan 10, 2007 3:14 pm

Thats the droids solution. There are many players who hate droids, because of its micromanagement.

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Postby MadViper » Mon Feb 02, 2009 4:08 pm

I would prefer this option:

Just add a switch to disable housing without altering the population growth in any other way. If nobody is able to use housing, i think some of the Production-Races-Advantage is gone away. And this would be better for the Balance.

But: In this case pop Growth racepics would be much more useful and should be more expensive.

The Population Growth should be altered with another Switch, for Example "/pop" for more overall Population growth.

In this case i think all will be happy and may play the way they like.

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Kornstalx
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Postby Kornstalx » Mon Dec 21, 2009 4:02 am

Bumping an old thread here.

I've modified Lord Brazen's /nohousing switch (via hex editor) to remove the default +150% pop growth that he added when the switch is used.

See here for more info (4th post):
viewtopic.php?t=737


-Kornstalx


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