Growth and population concerns

[player1]

I think gaining less population and loser losing less population from conquest is best way to go, to improve the balance.

Of course, that is just me. Maybe there are better methods.

[Apheirox]

Since any further growth depends on population, gaining population is most precious thing you can gain from conquest. You don't gain just territory like wide expansion, but population too, at the cost of some units. Much cheaper then using cloning/growth from production. Plus it cripples other faction as bonus, for the same reason.

That's where I think Pandora can mainly improve, really. At the moment, it's almost 100% a wargame only - conquest is everything. If it has a reworked growth model that makes planning expansion more indepth and perhaps the inclusion of 'Wonders'/'Secret Projects', it will add a lot of content to the game.

[fortydayweekend]

I think it's interesting that no-one has suggested making conquest more difficult!

Also wondering how many of these problems could be fixed by making the game just harder in general - so that after conquering your 2 closest neighbours you'd be on par with the others, rather than being way ahead. This might require an AI boost to growth as well as to morale. And would mean you'd *have* to rush early to have a shot at winning, but at least the game wouldn't feel like it was over by turn 100.

[fortydayweekend]

Sounds good on first thought. But would civilians really be able to escape a military occupation? Might it make more sense they die over X turns due to the occupation?

It could be more like refugees fleeing before the invasion (or as it happens), with the conquering army too busy fighting to be able to control the borders. To me that seems more realistic than genocide or bloodless occupation.

I don't think it would need a whole cross-factional migration system to work either - just have a % of the pop bleed out to nearby cities over several turns. Just by increasing the growth rate would do, it wouldn't even need to perfectly add up.

While we're talking about "what makes sense" I think there's a basic question about how loyal individual citizens are to their faction. If they're highly factionalistic then it makes sense to have bigger/longer morale penalties for conquered cities, and refugees fleeing the front lines. If they're just slaves to the dictator du jour then you need a different mechanic (e.g. population loss) to penalise conquest, because they'll be just as productive once the dust has settled.

[SephiRok]

The issue with reducing population or destroying buildings over time is that it can heavily fluctuate gains from the city -- which is annoying.

We've been discussing making the city become neutral (uncontrollable) during the takeover. That way we can do whatever we want with it during the transition period.

[player1]

Personally, I'm for any solution that will decrease population gain, as well as reduce population loss from city conquest, since population is too integral to economic system used in the game.

I mean, even if such city would have permanent moral penalty, population would still count for increasing city growth over whole empire.
More population, more growth more workers.


Hmm...

More brainstorming:

A) Permanent growth penalty for conquered cities? Like just halve natural growth or something like that. Would not annoy players since they will still have productive city after 10 turns. And there is still migration mechanic in place. Lessens the effects of conquest.

B) Global growth penalty for conqueror nations? The more foreign population taken, the bigger the penalty. Would need a way to track native and foreign population levels, in order to work.
Essentially an equalizer for increased population of conqueror. For example, have two nations with same population. One completely takes control of the other. Instead having both twice population and twice the grown before the war, have instead twice the population, but half of that growth (so growth stays on pre-war levels).

[fortydayweekend]

We've been discussing making the city become neutral (uncontrollable) during the takeover. That way we can do whatever we want with it during the transition period.

Would that also remove it from faction-wide resources (most specifically food) and mean it would need to be self-sufficient or starve? That could be an interesting dynamic, and you could have an "orbital food drop" operation to protect your investment.

[jdmillard]

The issue with reducing population or destroying buildings over time is that it can heavily fluctuate gains from the city -- which is annoying.

We've been discussing making the city become neutral (uncontrollable) during the takeover. That way we can do whatever we want with it during the transition period.

Hmm. I really like that idea.

[SephiRok]

Beta now has:
* Capturing a city now incurs a heavy growth penalty in the city and half of the natural growth emigrates back to the original owner's cities.

Feedback welcome!