Workshops should score higher

[DeletedUser627]

I'd like to see workshops score significantly higher per grid. Since Inno has mandated that we have to build more and more of them (by making it more and more difficult to gain supplies) - a little quid pro quo would be appreciated.

Make them score higher! We plan and calculate to make our cities grids as effective as possible...and then have to choose to include those huge ridiculous low-scoring monstrosities. We'd be just as happy to build workshops as we are manufactories - if they didn't lower our score per grid.

And while we're on the topic of supplies - I wonder if developers have ever re-calculated the availability of supplies in a city since the original failure of Neighborhood Help? We're supposed to have neighborhoods to visit - where we have the opportunity to gain supplies. Since we have empty neighborhoods without opportunity of return NH - supplies are constantly in short supply throughout the game.

Think about it: once your city gets to a reasonable size, do you run out of coins? Seldom, if ever. I can't even use all the coins available to me in basic play - there's always surplus for buying KP or wholesale goods. Supplies should be the same: manufactured reasonably and collected via our compelted provinces - with the same potential for surplus. Instead they've become the shortfall...unless we relent and build more inefficient workshops as the sole significant source for supplies. Elvenar wasn't designed to run with workshops being the sole source of supplies, and the Dwarven update didn't correctly increase the cost / production of workshops given their prominence in game strategy.

P.S. Neighborhood Help: I visit about 175 neighbors daily. Even if only 40 of them had discovered me and played daily, I would have 40 x 1710 supplies daily: 68,400. The fact that our neighborhoods are virtually empty has created a problem.

 

[DeletedUser]

There is some truth to this. I counted and I visit roughly 103 neighbors DAILY. Of those, 4 are in my fellowship. I receive regular return help from 4 who are not in my fellowship. 4% ROI where supplies are concerned for a 30 minute or more daily investment. Fortunately I belong to an active fellowship, and usually manage to hit 12-15 return help there, but all the rest comes from my workshops. Like bobbi, I am constantly burning off coins, but only rarely get surplus supplies, and every couple of weeks I have to partially or completely shut down my tier 3 factories to balance the shortfall. Or stop fighting/training altogether for days at a time. I don't think I'm wildly oversupplied with manufactories - running 8 workshops for 3 tier 3 (still at level 11 because I wouldn't have the supplies to run them at higher levels even if I had the population), 3 tier 2, and 4 tier 1 (planning to drop one tier 1 factory when they level up to 16 for space reasons & reduced production needs). The excess coins can make up for some loss of production on the lower tiers, but tier 3 goods are very pricey from the wholesaler. The Crystal Lighthouse helps a lot when I'm in shut down mode. I would add another workshop, but I would need 2 more expansions (probably closer to 3) for the workshop and the associated necessary houses, culture, & roads. Not to mention I will probably shortly be needing a whole expansion plus for the Magic Academy. The spells it produces may help some with the shortfall, but I am hesitant to burn my relics until the promised new method of acquisition materializes. The culture bonus helps keep supplies at a reasonable level atm, even though I don't get points for all that space in my city.

I was never someone who clicked through the declinable quests, but I did fulfill them whenever I could, because I needed that supply bonus. I'm not as picky about the scoring, although I do like to slowly see myself climbing the ranks. But there is definitely something off-kilter with the balance, and a lot of it stems from the many inactive players on the map. My neighborhood in Winyandor recently got a new influx of replacement cities (I've been playing 5 months, and that was the first time since I moved in), but I can probably count on my fingers how many are still playing out of the 60 or so who started out two weeks ago. And I hope that some of those who are still playing will eventually get to the point where they've discovered me, but I'm not holding my breath.

 

[Jixel]

To put a figure on how much difference being "self-sufficient" in supplies makes to score :

On the EN1 (International - Arendyll) server, I decided to not rely on repeatable quests or supplies from neighbour help (just fellowship help).
I have the full 9x9 grid filled now, and 19 workshops, to run 6 Tier3, 4 Tier2, and 5 Tier1 manufactories, plus the Barracks & 6 Armories.
(oh, and I run on 100% culture almost all of the time, unless I get a lucky run of boosts from the fellowship)

I probably need one or two more workshops, actually, so in practice sometimes I skip production on one or two of the Tier3 manufactories - I have 100-200k of everything stockpiled, it's not vital to run at maximum output every time

My city is not quite "optimal" (a few too many armories, because of a mistake in my spreadsheet which made them look better in points/square than they actually are ), and I only have two premium/diamond culture buildings, but my current score is a bit over 96,000. I estimate with some premium culture and a bit of optimisation, it could reach around 100-102k, while staying self-sufficient.

So it's probably reasonably valid to compare my possible/optimal score, to bobbipiazza here on US1 - call it 100k vs 113k - so the "workshop tax" would seem to be about 10-12%.

There's probably a case for either improving the supply of supplies in some way, or increasing the points available from workshops if that's how Inno wants to shape the game ...

 

[DeletedUser61]

I need to get around to comparing a few level 15 building types, to see how they measure up for Score = (Workers + Culture ) / Footprint.

It would obviously be feasible to plump up the Workers and Culture for workshop levels, starting around level 9 where they start to require supplies in any case, which would keep the costs low for the nubile cities while addressing the Score per Footprint issues that become interesting when you're trying to max out your city.

Once they have been upgraded, Residences and Workshops don't require ANYTHING other than a click, while Manufacturing facilities require ongoing contributions of Coins, Supplies, and (increasingly) secondary goods. The https://en.wiki.elvenar.com/index.php?title=Copper_Foundry#Purpose was our first example of a requirement for secondary goods, and it looks like Velvet will have similar requirements.

• Coins = moderate one-time cost per upgrade, no on-going costs
• Supplies = high one-time cost per upgrade, no on-going costs
• Goods = moderate one-time costs per upgrade, high on-going costs

If you consider "everything" that's required to manufacture goods, your variable costs will obviously much higher than zero, so a fair comparison would have to look at the number of cycles that are needed to reach a breakeven point. Once you've depreciated the fixed costs for Residences and Workshop they are "free", while Goods will always be expensive.

You COULD, of course, maximize your score by starving your Manufacturing Buildings, in lieu of just piling up more excess goods, but then you wouldn't even have a goldfish bowl.

 

[Jixel]

I need to get around to comparing a few level 15 building types, to see how they measure up for Score = (Workers + Culture ) / Footprint.

With 96 culture/square :
Planks level 19, 46.8 points/square. Marble 19, 45.74. Elixir 15, 45.49. Steel 19, 44.54. Magic Dust 15, 44.4. Crystal, 43.75. Gems 15, 43.2. Silk, 42.62. Scrolls, 41.39. Armory 17, 37.5. Workshop 17, 34.8.

The total footprint is :
Squares for the Manufactory itself.
Squares required for the Culture used by the Manufactory.
Squares required for the Residences to provide the Population used by the Manufactory.
Squares required for the Culture used by the Residences which provide the Population used by the Manufactory.

And points provided is :
Working population + culture used for the Manufactory
Culture used by the Residences which provide the Population used by the Manufactory

... I don't think I've missed anything. This time. Then again, a mistake in the spreadsheet I use for all this led me to overbuild armories on EN1, there could yet be a lurking bug to squish.

For a premium player, assuming they stock up on Mysterious Gate Keepers (183.3 culture/square), the numbers go up (49.45 for Planks 19 now), but the order stays the same, and Workshops still run up last with 36.0 points/square.

So without digressing too much from the original point: Workshops underperform in score relative to their current importance in the game.
Interestingly, the March InnoGames video mentioned that one of the new Fairy wonders will boost Supply production, if I remember correctly, so maybe this won't be such an issue.

 

[DeletedUser627]

This is really useful info, Jixel. Can you help me with some ancillary data?

For culture calculation, did you use the current highest non-premium building (like the Temple)?

It might be helpful to have a secondary calculation including required roads. Directly, I'd like to calculate mine in 5 ways: no road, smallest side, largest side, full corner and 1 square only. (Inside corners make me cringe - haha. )

Question: when you calculated the squares required by Residences, did you include 2 road grids / unit?

I think the inclusion of roads into the calculation would modify the relative scoring (Steel especially).

 

[DeletedUser594]

I'm hoping the update has a rather big jump in supply production with the upgrade. I'm running 13 workshops @ lvl17 with a 14th on the way and I just ran out of supplies (cycles 3-4 short + 1x9hr production).
I run 4steel(19), 3 scroll (15), and 2 dust (14,15) + a full queue with training size=296.(manufacturing 9hr cycles) I'm not sure what a fair trade off is in terms of workshop performance -vs- space/pop/cult. used and I haven't run the #'s but it seems a bit off that I would need more resources dedicated to supply.

 

[DeletedUser627]

Level 19 will now be 1.550/hr up from 1.160 L17. This isn't significant enough, in my opinion. We're going to be dependent on Spells.

And we were on the right track re the scoring: For L19 we'll need 3 more grid spaces, but about 400 combined pop/culture. See updated Wiki for details

Important edit

We'll need about 40,000 supplies for each residence upgraded from 17 to 19. For me, that's about 3,600,000 supplies.

Not to mention that a Fairy good has to be produced with Supplies...

 

[Jixel]

This is really useful info, Jixel. Can you help me with some ancillary data?

For culture calculation, did you use the current highest non-premium building (like the Temple)?

It might be helpful to have a secondary calculation including required roads. Directly, I'd like to calculate mine in 5 ways: no road, smallest side, largest side, full corner and 1 square only. (Inside corners make me cringe - haha. )

Question: when you calculated the squares required by Residences, did you include 2 road grids / unit?

I think the inclusion of roads into the calculation would modify the relative scoring (Steel especially).

Ooof. I hadn't considered roads at all, I figured that was "too hard"

... and now you've got me working out how to add it to the spreadsheet

Back to culture calculation - yes, using the highest non-premium building, 96/square from the Temple of Holy Fire.
(I figure many players who are adding a new factory/workshop/armory at that stage will mostly be adding their culture in the maximal way too)

And of course, the Wiki has been updated with Fairy details, I have some more updating to do


Edit 40 minutes later (to avoid multi-posting):
As expected, Silk/Crystal/Scrolls at level 19 are the new highest points/square.
With 123.3 culture/square (from the new Pond of Recreation, 5x6 / 3700 culture), they each get 54.1.
With the new premium maximum (Temple of Seeds, 3x7 / 4700 culture for 2400 diamonds), 224/square, they get 56.3.

Interesting that they're all so close - possibly someone at Inno saw the complaints (here and on the Beta forum, I think) that some goods had an advantage over others in points/square ... or maybe it was just luck

... and to stay just slightly on topic, even the level 19 workshop is the lowest in points/square, behind even the armory. (both around 39-41ish, whatever the culture)

 

[DeletedUser43]

The game is constantly rebalancing. I think you all have done an excellent job in examining this. I hope someone at the top reads this and forwards the info. My city too is always hurting for supplies. It is the number one reason I have to tediously scroll through the quests taking most of the fun out of this game and turning it into a boring grind.

Then, with the new bizarre quests, I have to have a lot of tiny workshops so I can set them to 3 hour cycles. I can't set my big workshops to 9 hours cycles when I sleep because then I won't have the two advanced tools I need with the Gain coins quest in order to get the 13,000 supplies bonus. (Did anyone understand that last sentence?)

So, I can't set my workshops for the most effective cycles due to this horrible quest. I would hope they remove the requirement to have advanced tools along with your coins in order to get the supplies bonus. And if they take away the supplies completely, then I have no way to get the supplies I need to make any goods.

 

[DeletedUser627]

Whether we like it or not, I think it's going to be Spells for Supplies...

They don't want us logging on to flip quests...but they do want us logging on for these upcoming 1-hour mandatory fairy productions (although there's a possibility they may change the requirement). And logging on repeatedly to run Spells for Supplies will be the only way to get enough supplies for all the Fairy needs. If we think we're short on supplies now, it's going to get much worse during Fairy. We'll need all our current supplies, plus supplies to produce a fairy good, plus supplies for all the building upgrades - most significant of which is 40k supplies per residence upgrade.

 

[DeletedUser684]

Changing the topic, I think. Bottom line: if you want to have a balanced city, you can't be a point-whore.

Edit: ... and I'm OK with that. You have to make the decision if the score is more important to you than real efficiency. I agree that the most efficient city SHOULD give you the highest score.

The level of balance that you are fighting for really only affects people fighting for the top slot. Since that is really only available to premium players, you are already talking about a subset of players, and of that subset of players, most probably don't really care (unless they are already in the top 20 or so). Essentially, while I appreciate the math and the attention to detail, you have a really limited audience. Since I'm purposefully not a premium player (to show people that it can be done reasonably well) it really is no skin off my nose whether they make this tweak or not. I'm focused on balance, because I will not be in the top slot, no matter how well I play. My goal is to eventually break into the top 100 with no premium buildings, but I don't think it is reasonable to expect better than that.

You could just as easily fight for points for culture buildings. It makes no sense to me that a city with 170% production boost would score lower than a monstrosity of buildings that produces less in total.

 

[DeletedUser627]

Incorrect premise, Omidawn, because I'm a point-whore, in your terms, with a balanced city. Perhaps you should take an attitude check? I'm a premium player who consistently lobbies on behalf of non-paying players - and I'm not the only one - and we don't deserve your contempt. Without us, you wouldn't have a free game to play at all. You should think of me as your frickin' fairy godmother and enjoy the ball for free.

You say you want to play non-premium "to show people it can be done reasonably well". Perhaps you might want to make friends with the others who have already done so...and are steadily declining in the ranks. The trend is going in the reverse direction of your goals, unfortunately. Y'all might consider putting up a Google sheet updated regularly with non-payer scores - your own informal leaderboard.

Back to the Workshop issue: the low-scoring workshops and under-production of Supplies affects everyone. You currently have 9 workshops, and only room for 4 underdeveloped T1's: this is the type of scenario produced by the shortage of supplies. You should be able to run with fewer workshops in order to make room for residences / T1's, but you can't.

You could just as easily fight for points for culture buildings. It makes no sense to me that a city with 170% production boost would score lower than a monstrosity of buildings that produces less in total.

I don't understand this - culture buildings don't give production boosts. In any case, the yin / yang of culture vs population is integral to the game, so I don't think we'd really advocate for culture buildings to produce score.

 

[DeletedUser684]

Point-whore was maybe more derogatory than I intended, and I apologize. I was looking for a term that would make people examine motives, rather than just the idea. If you got past that to the rest of what I said, you will see that I appreciate the work that you all do on behalf of everyone else... it does help for someone to obsess about the details.

The point that I tried to make was that focusing on the supplies is just one thing that needs attention. Saying that the problem is with the point value of the building really makes no sense to me. If you have room to build more of them, then build more of them. If you are saying that you don't want to build them because it isn't worth as much as a factory, then your concern isn't with the amount of supplies that you have, but with the damage to your score that building more supplies would cause. I should have said that instead of being derogatory, but I was being lazy. I believe it is valid to be concerned that a building is undervalued. I believe that culture buildings are much more grossly undervalued than Workshops.

In my opinion, there needs to be (just as importantly) tweaks to the culture. The larger your city, the less likely it is to get high culture boosts, even with decent Aid. Imagine for a moment if you have, on a regular basis, 25-35% more supplies... would that resolve most people's shortage? Making Workshops more valuable so that you can have more of them without sacrificing points is valid, but that is only a part of the problem with the shortage of supplies. The optimum city, as far as the mechanics of scoring goes, would have zero excess population and zero excess culture, with all of your "high-point" buildings at maximum level. If they actually gave equal points for the culture buildings themselves, you might see the production that you need through more culture buildings, instead of needing more workshops.... and all other production would be boosted at the same time. At the very least you would have more than one option for maximizing your city... either by building more factories/workshops or by increasing culture to make the ones you have more efficient.

That is why I think that giving points to culture buildings is relevant. The yin-yang of population and culture just means that you have to have them in order to build your point buildings. Since they have no value in themselves (speaking of culture buildings... residences do contribute to the score, minimally), only the minimum culture would (or should) be built in order to maximize your city score -- even at the cost of losing the culture boost. I believe that the culture boost was also intended to be a source of the supplies that you are looking for, and integral to the game. I am saying that fixing the non-value of culture would substantially impact the need for additional workshops, as well as give more flexibility to what actually can determine an optimal build. Yes, I agree that having the Workshops valued properly would be a benefit. I think that giving point value to cultural buildings is just as important and would also have just as much impact. I am also stumping for ways to make culture buildings produce more culture aside from neighborhood aid.

Additionally, I think that the culture level (base) of your city should be a direct multiplier for your overall city score... especially if no points are given to the buildings themselves. That in itself might entirely change the way people build.

Again, sorry for being derogatory... I probably should have started by saying I was impressed with everyone in this discussion. My fault.

 

[DeletedUser61]

There's a thoughtful article at http://mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm that provides us with some useful terminololy, and makes the essential point that various players types are NEEDED, in equilibrum, for a game to remain healthy.

• Achievers will jump through whatever hoops are available, to maximize they're score. Spreadsheets, and understanding the game mechanics, are useful to the extent that they help you reach your goals.
• Explorers are more interested in the mechanics of the game itself. Understanding the game mechanics IS the goal, but "useful" is just a way to get to the edge of the known world.
• Socializers are more concerned about the other players in the world, which merely provides background and context.
• Killers (or Control Freaks) keep everybody else honest. They're interesting in dominating other players, by whatever means.

It's an interesting read, which provides some of the language that we need in order to "walk in other shoes."

To be obvious about it, the deer will always complain about the wolves, but without the wolves (or hunters) to hold the population in check, the deer will starve during the winter. The article does an excellent job of wading through the various methods by which the various players types keep each other in check, and healthy.

~~~~~~~

To the point of the "Workshops" discussion, the models that have been offered, heretofore, have been neglecting VARIABLE COSTS. Residences and Workshops DO NOT have any variable costs, but Manufacturing Buildings DO have variable costs.

For an accurate comparison of the costs per square points contributions, the PURPOSE of a building must be considered. A starved Manufacturing Building is just decoration, so for a WORKING comparison, the Manufacturing Building analysis must consider:

1. One-time costs, including upgrades

• Initial Coins
• Initial Supplies
• Initial Goods

2. PLUS the support facilities that WOULD NOT be needed if there were no on-going variable costs

• Ongoing Coins
• Ongoing Supplies
• Ongoing Goods (for Copper and now for the various Fairy Goods)

If you're just after a maximized snapshot score, rather than a functioning city, then you can ignore all of the variable costs and just consider fixed costs, and the related benefits.

 

[DeletedUser684]

Seriously? Did you even bother to read my apology? Now I feel like you owe me one. Stop being so defensive... this isn't even a discussion of premium vs. non-premium, and I'm sorry I even mentioned it. I didn't realize it was such a sore spot. I would appreciate it if you wouldn't attribute your own prejudices to me. I have no problem with premium players. I only brought it up to acknowledge that I am not in the same "arena" as you, and that the issue doesn't impact me as much. Get over it.

 

[DeletedUser1161]

I need to get around to comparing a few level 15 building types, to see how they measure up for Score = (Workers + Culture ) / Footprint.

I have them for the lvl 15 buildings in my city. I was calculating how many houses and cultural buildings I needed to plan for. Numbers are points of score/grid square. These are all elven buldings.

Main hall 89.4
Barracks 90.2
Gems 110.9
Silk 103.3
Planks 78.2
Armory 76.5
Workshop 53.8
Housing 19.1

 

[DeletedUser1161]

I don't understand this - culture buildings don't give production boosts. In any case, the yin / yang of culture vs population is integral to the game, so I don't think we'd really advocate for culture buildings to produce score.

Culture boosts supply production. You only need 2/3 the workshops if you're running at 150% culture. The supply shortage you're talking about is exacerbated because players who want to score high are basically penalized for building extra culture.

You point out correctly that dead neighborhoods cause a supply shortage, but it's not only from reciprocal help but from less polishing as well. If we had active neighborhoods, not only would we be getting more supplies, but we would be running at higher and more consistent culture percentages. My fellows are awesome about polishing, but the polishes are spread out over 24 hours so even though my fellowship is very active, I often log in with only a few buildings polished and maybe the first level of boost. If I got more visitors, I'd build more culture and maybe run at a higher boost percentage, increasing available supplies.

 

[DeletedUser627]

Omidawn, thanks for your gracious apology; please accept mine for being quick to take offence.

I see your point wherein you're talking about the Workshops point scoring. It's sound rationale, if we ignore the fact that the dead neighborhoods are the source of the problem. But the domino train starts with dead neighborhoods, thus a lack of supplies, thus we "flipped quests" while possible, thus we have to build too many workshops, thus we have to have Spells and get back into repeated "clickfests" in order to maximize supply production in order to get through Fairy....

In all the falling dominoes, yes, the point I made was that I especially resent the thought of building so many workshops because they score inappropriately...but it's a resentment stemming from the developers initial error compounded by their insistence that we have to accept solutions that don't even begin to correct their errors. Why didn't they just decide to place a default supply credit for visiting inactive cities - or an adjusted supply credit for every city visited? Why not simply adjust the output of the Workshops months ago?

In terms of score for culture buildings, try to look at it this way: we don't get score for buildings. We gain score for using the population and culture. If the buildings themselves scored, that would be double-dipping. What you're suggesting as a scoring matrix - x points per building - is a very different approach. The Elvenar approach is score based on what you make and put into a building - population, culture, and soon kp (for Wonders).

Just to be certain we're on the same page, culture bonus only boosts taxes and supplies - not manufactories.

Usually when a player decides to move away from culture buildings and forego the bonus, it's not about score. For example, my city needs 20k culture to get to the 125 bonus level. Since I only have small culture buildings, NH wasn't useful...and building 20k worth of culture requires more grid space than building workshops. If you're correct, and the culture boost was intended as a means of gaining supplies, then it's another developer flop. They provided the Goddesses and Gatekeepers, and the heavy use of these makes culture bonus well-nigh unattainable. (One has to select Dragons or Temples and have a well-disciplined fellowship in order to keep culture bonus in a fully-expanded city).

Lastly, I'll admit that I personally have a bad taste in my mouth over the supply / workshop issue. During the winter, several of us calculated how to maximize quests in order to not need workshops at all - and it meant deleting Goddesses and relying on residences. I started the deletions and in a week Inno changed the quests to the current ones - returning full advantage to premium players. We had speculated that Inno wouldn't care to see their top-scoring players not sporting premium buildings...and it seems to us that we were correct. One of the things I saw is that Inno is capable of making rapid changes when they think it's important (even though this quest change sparked a significant forum controversy)...so if they had wanted to, they could have chosen to correct the Supply imbalance at any time. My God, if we had a diamond for every time we've heard "re=balancing the game", we'd all be premium players! But no, their initial projections for supplies via NH were incorrect and their solution is "build more inefficient workshops".

 

[DeletedUser684]

I think culture does boost factories as well. I'm sitting at 100% at the moment, so I can't verify this. Culture doesn't boost the new race buildings... something that I think is a glaring error.

Edit: If your production shows green, it is being boosted: either by relics, culture, or the new race portal. Since I am at 100% and I don't have any non-boosted goods buildings, I can't say for sure that factories are boosted by culture, or if they were only being boosted by the relics. Someone with non-boosted goods and 125% or better culture could verify this... if your production is green then culture is boosting the factory.