A couple noob questions about colony ships

[dathon]

I don't think that trade could ever truly harm the AI. Remember that while trade might be the same, the AI gets some pretty hefty bonuses, especially at higher difficulty levels. That's why they are able to expand at the rate they do compared to the player while still carrying a large military. So while trade might make a small dent, the massively discounted prices they pay for everything more than makes up for it.

EDIT: And before you ask, I have no idea what they get bonuses on, or how much they are.

dathon

[jmas]

pkrcel, dathon, possibly Sullla too (not sure what you thought of my reply), we may just have to disagree on this one.

I started this discussion with the acknowledgment that if the human player has a stronger economy than an AI and the AI doesn't have a way to close the gap, then "the writing is on the wall" in most cases, whether one tries to take advantage of trade dynamics or not. I was not trying to exaggerate the significance of this matter of trade.

Sargon posted that according to what he saw, AIs (other than the Humans, I assume) do begin trade agreements with revenues of -30% of the amount of the agreement, and the revenues then increase slowly, as they do for the human player.

Looking at pkrcel's message, I see that my first post did not address some of the specifics and therefore, it was possible to interpret the post as assuming a "best-case" scenario, e.g. -7.5% revenue for an AI on each of five trade agreements. For my part, I did use the figure -7.5%, and yes, it would be lower if an agreement between the hypothetical "gullible trader" AI and another of its comrades was lower. I did not specifically mention -7.5% times 5 because I knew that was the "best-case" scenario and might not be possible in practice.

pkrcel posted:

...like for example lasting for one turn, and diminishing i 5-10 turns....

In a recent game, it appears from the data I have that I just about "broke even" (the agreement started with a -22 effect on my revenue and when it ended I lost 23 BC in profit) on a trade agreement that lasted _forty_ years (and was not increased during that time). So the "negative revenue" phase of the agreement could easily have been 20 years or even a little more, since significant trade improves diplomatic relations, which in turn accelerate profitability--in other words, in theory it's a "snowball" effect that can pick up momentum, though in my experience the effect appears to be modest. Then there was the time in that game when I renegotiated a "mature" trade agreement (one from which I was getting 100% of the agreed amount). EDIT: The agreement was actually producing revenue at about 66% of maximum. However, my other statements about this trade agreement (following this edit) are accurate.

Revenue went down so much that by the time I attacked the AI (almost 60 turns later) and the agreement was broken (and shortly thereafter the game was won for me), I hadn't made up the money I could have had by sticking with the old agreement. From the rate that revenue had been increasing, I calculated it would have taken a total of about _eighty_ years under the new agreement to make up the difference. Only after that could I have pocketed extra profit.

The MOO manual says that you won't have positive income until after "10-12 years" under an agreement, but frankly, I think it's longer even with a first-time agreement (except maybe for the Humans), and the effects of renegotiating an agreement that's been in place for a while (like I described above) seem to me to be disproportionate to the change in the agreement amount itself (i.e. you can lose more in yearly revenue (I lost 105 BC/year with that change) than you upped the agreement by (75 BC in that case)).

I acknowledge: No, it doesn't seem possible to know what AIs are trading with each other at a given moment.

Remember that while trade might be the same, the AI gets some pretty hefty bonuses, especially at higher difficulty levels. That's why they are able to expand at the rate they do compared to the player while still carrying a large military. So while trade might make a small dent, the massively discounted prices they pay for everything more than makes up for it.

Not to be picayune, but bonuses and discounts are two different things. Sargon posted on Civfanatics that the AI gets -20% to production on Easy (yes, on Easy), +25% on Average, +50% on Hard, and +100% on Impossible. I very much believe that these bonuses are reflected in the Production bars on the stats screen and that that's why the bars are so long on Impossible. Since the AI seems to get all the other benefits of using this bonus production in the same way as regular production, it makes sense to me that it would also count toward how large of a trade agreement they can have. If someone has evidence to the contrary, please point it out.

I agree with you dathon that the trade dynamics could only make "a small dent" given the AI's other advantages [edit: on higher difficulty levels], especially on Impossible. However, I will reiterate that my whole proposed scenario assumes that the human player has a larger economy than the AI "victim"... and that I acknowledged that in that case, the human player has advantage anyway, and the effect of this trading would not be overwhelming.

I am fairly convinced that Ais do not generally open trade (or open too much) if it will be hurting their economy overall....not that I am THAT experienced to be 100% sure....

I do not know whether the AI will consider the effect of a prospective agreement on its economy as pkrcel suggests. I don't recall seeing anything about that in the strategy guide or any posts I've read, so to me that is unknown ground. If someone knows something about it, please share.

[pkrcel]

pkrcel, dathon, possibly Sullla too (not sure what you thought of my reply), we may just have to disagree on this one.

Not necessarily, I do not disagree with your priciple here...I only doubt it woud be a viable tactic to diminish an AI production outcome.

Looking at pkrcel's message, I see that my first post did not address some of the specifics and therefore, it was possible to interpret the post as assuming a "best-case" scenario, e.g. -7.5% revenue for an AI on each of five trade [...cut...]


The MOO manual says that you won't have positive income until after "10-12 years" under an agreement, but frankly, I think it's longer even with a first-time agreement (except maybe for the Humans), and the effects of renegotiating an agreement that's been in place for a while (like I described above) seem to me to be disproportionate to the change in the agreement amount itself (i.e. you can lose more in yearly revenue (I lost 105 BC/year with that change) than you upped the agreement by (75 BC in that case)).

I acknowledge: No, it doesn't seem possible to know what AIs are trading with each other at a given moment.

I actually trusted the trade algorythm as stated in the manual...but I also didn't mean to write some absolute truth with my statement, I was only pointing out that in the fairly common case, the "malus" for initial trade starts to diminish almost immediately...it may take LONG to overcome, but may take way shortert to get to managable limits (like be cut in half?).

Not to be picayune, but bonuses and discounts are two different things. Sargon posted on Civfanatics that the AI gets -20% to production on Easy (yes, on Easy), +25% on Average, +50% on Hard, and +100% on Impossible. I very much believe that these bonuses are reflected in the Production bars on the stats screen and that that's why the bars are so long on Impossible. Since the AI seems to get all the other benefits of using this bonus production in the same way as regular production, it makes sense to me that it would also count toward how large of a trade agreement they can have. If someone has evidence to the contrary, please point it out.

So far, I guess you're 100% right...in fact on Impossible the larger Trade agreements tend to become even larger :D..at least to my losing experience

I agree with you dathon that the trade dynamics could only make "a small dent" given the AI's other advantages [edit: on higher difficulty levels], especially on Impossible. However, I will reiterate that my whole proposed scenario assumes that the human player has a larger economy than the AI "victim"... and that I acknowledged that in that case, the human player has advantage anyway, and the effect of this trading would not be overwhelming.

I understand your point, but if you have a larger economy overall (I mean factoring *IN* the AI bonues, I'm talking about aboslute GNP)...you're being damaged MORE in absolute terms (even thou, you're par on proportional terms....again, excluding the Humans from the equation).

I do not know whether the AI will consider the effect of a prospective agreement on its economy as pkrcel suggests. I don't recall seeing anything about that in the strategy guide or any posts I've read, so to me that is unknown ground. If someone knows something about it, please share.

I do not have any solid proof of this, my reasoning comes from several episodes, recently I had at least two times the Meklars refuse the maxmium possible agreement (while on Relaxed terms) and agreeing for the middle one.
I mean two times in the same game, XenoInd personality, first time I had to settle for ~250 over ~500 if IIRC, and the second one was WAAAY later, (maybe on Neutral terms thou) with some 1000BCs of difference.

The only reason I could think of is that the Meklars were only eager to accept an immediate loss 'no greater than X' or something along these lines to their actual production output.

I'd point out this is mostly a gut feeling deducting from possible causes....It may very well be that this is scaled also by the current relations between the two reces and whatever...

[jmas]

Thank you for the reply. I see we do have common ground. Below I've quoted points I have something to say about, but please know I did read all of your points and appreciate them.

I actually trusted the trade algorythm as stated in the manual...but I also didn't mean to write some absolute truth with my statement, I was only pointing out that in the fairly common case, the "malus" for initial trade starts to diminish almost immediately...it may take LONG to overcome, but may take way shortert to get to managable limits (like be cut in half?).

It's unfortunate, but neither the manual nor the strategy guide explain trade adequately. Since I've read that some things (e.g., the AI production bonuses on the various difficulty levels) were changed from the time the guide was written to the time the game (or at least version 1.3) was issued, I wonder if the trade equation was also changed. The strategy guide says that if you have an agreement of (for example) 100 BC at a certain level of profitability, and you increase the agreement by 50 BC, then the newly-added 50 BC contributes -30% times its amount (50) to revenue (-30% * 50, which is -15 BC), but since your previous agreement was for twice the amount of increase (100 = 50 * 2), the level of profit you had on that agreement will be given twice as much "weight" (i.e., multiplied by 2) and THEN added to the -15. Well, there must either be more to the story, or the equation was changed and the guide is now completely wrong about that, because using that math, you could never lose more than -30% times the increase in trade. The formula given doesn't explain how I could lose 105 BC/year with a 75 BC/year increase in an agreement; -30% * 75 is only -22.5 BC which I think should "round down" (or perhaps with MOO it would be more accurate to say "be truncated") to -22.

From what I've seen in my games, it seems like you are right about initial agreements not being "in the red" for too long, although a friend told me about a case where he was trading with one or more races already, and opened a first-time agreement with a new race, and lost more than -30% times the amount of that new agreement according to the display on the Planets screen. And once agreements have been around for a while...it seems like there is more potential for loss. In the case that I shared: Eighty years to break even on an increase in trade, not even the maximum possible increase? And our relations, while not the best possible :kisskiss: , were decent? That seems to call for such a long vision / or blind loyalty to agreements, that it doesn't fit well with the rest of the game (IMO of course).

If by chance anyone out there loves collecting data and using it to figure out what equation could explain trade (even roughly, since there are complications, e.g. relations do play a part), I'd really like to get a better idea of what it could be, and would be happy to share data I collect.

I understand your point, but if you have a larger economy overall (I mean factoring *IN* the AI bonues, I'm talking about aboslute GNP)...you're being damaged MORE in absolute terms (even thou, you're par on proportional terms....again, excluding the Humans from the equation).

I don't understand your meaning here. In absolute terms, it sounds like from what sargon said that profit and loss should be even on both sides (excluding the Humans) under any agreement that can be formed, no matter the size of the economies involved. The proportional terms are what make it interesting and what I think could be used to advantage (at times small, especially on harder difficulty levels where the AI has other perks). If you have a larger economy than an AI, then any negative revenues, or drops in revenue from a once-profitable agreement, are proportionally smaller for you, because, say, -100 BC is a smaller percentage of 6000 BC (let's say 6000 BC is your income from "Planets" on the Planets screen) than it is of 4000 BC (say a smaller AI).

(Below: regarding whether AIs consider what different levels of trade will do to their economy)

I do not have any solid proof of this, my reasoning comes from several episodes, recently I had at least two times the Meklars refuse the maxmium possible agreement (while on Relaxed terms) and agreeing for the middle one.
I mean two times in the same game, XenoInd personality, first time I had to settle for ~250 over ~500 if IIRC, and the second one was WAAAY later, (maybe on Neutral terms thou) with some 1000BCs of difference.

The only reason I could think of is that the Meklars were only eager to accept an immediate loss 'no greater than X' or something along these lines to their actual production output.

I'd point out this is mostly a gut feeling deducting from possible causes....It may very well be that this is scaled also by the current relations between the two reces and whatever...

Thank you for explaining your experience. You may well be right. I'd be interested to hear if you see a similar pattern in future games, especially when dealing with non-Xeno leaders. They (Xenophobic leaders) say no a lot; the guide says they have a -50 modifier to all diplo decisions. I think every personality would have a modifier of some kind, because I recall (I don't have the guide with me right now) that Ruthless leaders have one of -30, Aggressive -10, Honorable +10, Pacifistic I think has +20, Erratic ranges randomly from -40 to +40, and also, with regard to racial objectives, the guide says that Diplomats are more likely to offer or accept trade agreements. Anyway, seeing what happens with non-Xeno, non-Erratic leaders, and being mindful of whether a leader/race is Diplomat or not, could give you (and others of us ) a feel for whether the AI's "running the numbers" and when they will say yes or no. I do think the guide says relations factors into "yes" or "no" but is silent on whether relations interacts with the level of trade proposed to yield a yes or no.