W3C - Game updates Augus 2023

Small updates are being installed from time to time.
They include some tuning of of corporations and documentation updates
that are overdue.

We expect this to continue in the coming weeks.

To execute such updates, processing must be stopped.
most such events take 2 or 3 minutes and are done at times when traffic is low.

I am glad someone pointed out the electric price changes. I haven't been very active on the forum as of late.....but the loss of long-term players is truly starting to worry me. "Small updates" such as a 10% drop in price of a major commodity does not help the slow train of departures of long-term players. On Kebir Blue alone (which is already low on long-term players) we have lost at least 2 major players in the past few weeks that have explicitly left due to stuff like this.


It would have been great to at least know about ahead of time about the price change. Having country profits drop by about $12 billion is not what I expected when I logged in this morning.

As we said several weeks ago, we will make changes to the energy markets and corporations. we also said that the price of electric power may decline.

The price of electric power is indeed declining. This will among others reduce the cost of all corporations, health education etc. and increase profitability.

The production level of the traditional electric power corporations
increases a bit which preserves their profitability and may help in reducing shortages.

Wind farms remain very profitable.

AJ Massey,

Do you really think that someone leaves because electric power becomes 10% cheaper?
despite the decline in cost? improved profitability and very profitable energy producing corporations?

We can stop all developments and keep the game as it is.

Instead, we keep adding functions and many times it requires changes.

The next upgrade will include another small decline in the cost of electric power. Profitability will remain or increase a bit.

 

I mean, AJ didn't say that people are leaving because of the lowering of a price. He said that it isn't helping. And it's much less about the nerf itself, and much more about how you carry out your 'upgrades' Andy. You completely vanish for weeks at a time with no contact at all. When you do show up you make multiple sometimes very significant changes that a fair amount of the time are not shared with players. Even this one currently in question, do you view a 10% change to the price in the most used product in the game to be something so minor that you don't even owe it to your players to say that you made the change? Even now your suggestion is 'another small decline'. What is small to you?

What testing are you even doing to back up the idea that profitability remains or increases? For this specific product, Electric Power, you do realize you have three different corporations that in essence produce it r

Andy:

Please know, and as Auditor said, I do not believe that players are leaving because of a change in the price of a commodity. Much of the changes you have done since the last time I played (roughly 2013-2016) have been amazing. And I thank you and the team for making those changes - it has been a huge improvement to the game. That being said, I do believe that something is causing long-term, serious, and important players to leave Simcountry. Not the changes in themselves, but how the changes happen.

My point is that the players here long term, the ones create and sustain the community (the community that no longer seems to exist in the forum as it did six months ago) care about what we create and how we create it. Creating something for the long-term takes planning, education, and time. Abrupt changes without warning, like the change in commodity prices for example, derail that strategy greatly. Again, changes are

Possibly only relevant to KB readers:

On the note of changes, some may have noticed that Assets maintenance corp profits are tanking. It's due to rising cost of materials, and I'm not sure if the GM has increased some prices, or if the market has just been ruffled.

My model suggests they will do better with lower salaries and lower quality supplies. I've set all of mine to buy Q120 supplies and use 100 salaries in order to quell these effects. Much like it was with production plants, the cost of materials increases so much at Q220 that it reverses any gains from selling at higher quality.

Production plants were basically the same, but now they are just wiped out by some sort glitch or market manipulation, looks to be same thing that has affected Defense Fort corps, and some others where demand just disappeared.

-hymy-

We do not believe that maintenance products will become less profitable.
fluctuations always take place with changes in the price of raw materials but based on the working model of these corporations, they are among the most profitable in Simcountry.

In general, corporations are far more profitable than they were in past years.

Andy,

The monthly profit dropped from ~4-5B a month to ~2-3 B a month. Could be normal fluctuation, yes. I never said it wasn't. I was simply posting advice on how to deal with this.

-hymy-

James,

There can be several reasons for a temporary decline.
what I am saying is, that the base structure of these corporations is very profitable and in general, they are very profitable.

however, if you see this for a prolonged period, please let us know.

These corporations are among the largest in Simcountry and they depend more on market conditions.
this is the reason they have a very high profit potential. It should cover for short periods on instability.