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 right? Wind, the system that you pushed so hard when you introduced it, has seen nothing but decline from all of these changes that you say increase profitability. The tiny specific set of micromanaged parameters that the wind industry has to operate within right now to not lose money is made worse by every one of these unannounced 'updates'.

Interesting little tidbit of information. Game levels. They're absolutely hard to get to higher levels, as it should be. There is nothing wrong with that. But with Wind specifically, which I cannot stress enough you pushed super hard as a future key component of the game that was going to stretch beyond just money when you introduced your pollution features, it is actually now impossible to reach the top game level with Wind as a player's primary corporate industry even with the most favorable settings for maximizing a player's finance index score. That right there should mean an immense amount to you. Game level should 100% be hard. It should take planning to reach the upper levels. You have nerfed wind to the point that it is a statistical impossibility to reach the upper levels while using it, under these random 'small' changes.

As I've said countless times, you are bleeding players not because of one individual change. You are losing players because you are completely deaf to them, you come and go as you please, and your changes, when you actually share them, seem completely based around what you personally like as a player yourself. Game News still hasn't been updated in closing in on a year. TA is dead. You're actively destroying your last big product introduced into the game. And you disappear for weeks at a time without any notice to the players that pay for service in this game. Until you can stop taking offense to every problem brought up to you and start listening to the actual substance and realize hey there might actually be a problem, the game will continue to die. Make no mistake, it is absolutely dying.

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 necessary and do improve the game if they are needed - I understand that. But it seems that players, myself included, are simply asking for those changes to be explicitly stated so that we can react or plan accordingly.

In the case of electricity prices, I came to realize it only AFTER it occurred due to the decrease in total revenue in my countries. Revenue affects our financial index..... And, if the game documentation is correct (despite not been updated in some time), then we all know that financial index can have some effect on EVERYTHING for a country such as welfare index, game level, and individual corporation profits. The welfare index, in turn, affects the corporate production levels which then affects profit, too. Albeit they are SMALL changes - I am not saying this is life changing. But when players build something, I am sure a majority of us want to be able to then enjoy the game without worrying what changes will occur that we will need to react to.


Auditor:

Thank you for pointing out what you did and clarifying what I was saying. I am sure we are on the same page with how we see things happening, and in all honestly, I look up to you and other long-term players who know the game well. Seeing you and James identify and tackle the source of the hard-to-see problems makes me feel like players are looking to help improve the game and prevent cheaters or glitches from occurring - thank you for putting in the effort that you do!

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.