Victoria 3 - Dev Diary #68 - Patch 1.1 Changelog (part 4)

[reaver_k]

Will Korea's population ever be corrected to the historical 16 million or so? According to multiple studies estimated from quite extensive harvest and tax records as well as censuses, Joseon's population actually exceeded 18 million in the 1750s and then stagnated slowly.

The Yangban are a pain in the ass to extricate, at least give us the masses!

 

[Fantasy295]

First, thanks for all the hard work, both in this patch and overall ! I spent a lot of hours on Victoria 2, and the improvements in the game play, especially in the underlying economic modeling, are truly fantastic!! Great job!!!

That being said, since this seems to have turned into a bit of a "I hope you fix XXX next" thread , I wanted to call out the suggestion by @neroden here (sorry - spam filter won't let me post real link): forum/threads/victoria-iii-most-of-the-world-has-no-ports-1920s.1551913/ (that would make Convoys a "normal" good Ports a "normal" factory that convert Clippers into Convoys in order incentivize the AI building Ports) and ask if it's on your radar for 1.2 or beyond.

I think it's a great idea, and that it has the potential to also lead to a fix for an issue that I don't see a way around: I don't know how to open a trade route with non-neighbors if I'm a land-locked country.

If you extended @neroden's suggestion (as he suggests) to also include land transportation (i.e. transportation is represented as a Caravans/TrainRoutes good that is produced by Railroads), then I think the Convoys-as-a-good mechanic has the potential to solve the land-locked trade issue. You could set up the game mechanics so that if a country had a neighbor with ports, the cost of the trade route would include paying the neighbor for Caravans to transport it across the appropriate states, and paying someone's Convoys to send it overseas if necessary. A different version of this idea would to allow a country to negotiate a special kind of "transportation" trade deal with another neighboring country for access to purchase that country's Caravans (for transit across land states) and/or a maritime 3rd party country to purchase Convoys (for transit across sea states) that would then be consumed as part of a normal trade route for goods. A trade route would be possible if there was a transit path where for every leg of the path either the buyer or the seller had such a transportation deal in place. I suspect this sort of mechanism would have a lot of potential to simulate "carrying trade" economics (in the sense that there's a 3rd party to the trade route who is supplying the transportation) and/or the Great Silk Roads.

I did see a "yes, we're looking at this" message in the original thread, but just wanted to bump it here. Thanks!

I agree with Convoys-as-a-good. I also hope there is Qualification-as-a-good, because college students should pay tuition.

 

[Cronicas]

That's slightly different than the bug I encountered. In my game, no events fired at all after the first one so the expedition couldn't even fail.

In my case it was a bit random (like the options you get to choose from in events). at the end of each month the expedition could by itself advance, increase the danger, both of them, or nothing would happen.
And during the entire expedition, which lasts months or more than a year, I only got 2 or 3 events. So it will also depend on luck and what options come out (and I always have bad luck in this haha)

The fact is that a bug is occurring with it and I think they have made a mistake by lowering the difficulty of the expeditions, when if all the events come out they are even easy to overcome

 

[Sbrubbles]

I wonder if a flat 10% increase to all import and export tariffs is enough to eliminate all trade price inversions.

This would be a simple enough solution that could be done through modding without developer involvement, but I guess it wouldn't work for free trade

 

[MarkBrandenburg]

I also hope there is Qualification-as-a-good, because college students should pay tuition.

Should they though? Significant tuition payments seem to be a post-WW2 development, and then mostly in the Anglosphere. German universities, for example, still remain almost free, with only administrative and public transit fees paid.

 

[gkbba]

Should they though? Significant tuition payments seem to be a post-WW2 development, and then mostly in the Anglosphere. German universities, for example, still remain almost free, with only administrative and public transit fees paid.

thats not exactly true. depending what you mean with "administrative fee", tuitions in germany are a state issue and I paid a modest(compared to US levels) tuition in Munich, Bavaria.
However I agree with your general point - e.g. Austria has no tuition as long as within regular time + 2semesters, and only a 30euro/semester fee for the student representation group (interest group, idk how you translate it to english).

 

[PedroLuiz]

Not a bad suggestion, but this would require us to have floating wage levels for every profession type in a building. At the moment, buildings only keep track of one "wage rate", which is the wage it would pay a (non-discriminated) Laborer, and other professions get paid some multiple of that. Under a system that relied more on Qualifications to determine labor competition than is the case currently, we would need for buildings to be able to pay e.g. Engineers a lot more than Machinists due to the increased pressure on that pool of workers. That is something I would like to explore in the future, but it adds a fair amount of complexity.

More nightmares I imagine

 

[Tempscire]

The pricing function is linear, ranging from 0.25 to 1.75 of base price and reaching those bounds when sell / buy is 2:1 and 1:2 vice versa and progressing linearly based on the ratio between buy and sell orders in between. Not sure where the claim to a concave pricing function is coming from, this is pretty well outlined in both tooltips and the defines file (the PRICE_RANGE and BUY_SELL_DIFF_AT_MAX_FACTOR defines in particular).

The price inversions are rather originating from traders optimizing their volume based on an average of pre- and post-trade prices, but then applying the full brunt of this volume as Sell and Buy orders in the respective markets. This essentially lets them execute a number of profitable transactions "before" the final market prices are actually set, leading domestic market agents to have to buy or sell at (probably) unfair prices by comparison, particularly when one market is much bigger than the other. We'll try to address it like I said, but please understand that even if a different algorithm was to work better and look more sane at large volumes, there's no guarantee this will magically solve all problems without causing new ones.

If the wiki is correct, the pricing function is the following:

price = Base_price*(1+0,75((buy-sell)/min(Buy,Sell)))

Now lets says you have a market E with Buy_E=200 and Sell_E=300 and a market I with Buy_I=200 and Sell_I=100, a base price of 1 and a trade route exporting t goods from from E to I. Then the price difference is:

PD = price_I-price_E = 0,75((200-100-t)/(min(100+t,200)-(100-300+t)/min(200+t,300))=0,75((100-t)/(100+t)-(-100+t)/(200+t)) if 0=<t=<100.
This is definitely not linear in t!
In fact even in a single market the price is not linear in the traded volume for example in I we have
P_I(t) = 1+0,75((100-t)/(100+t))=1+0.75(-1+200/(100+t)) for 0=<t=<100. This is a constant plus a convex function in t, as 1/t is clearly a strictly convex function (on the positive half-axis).

So either the wiki is wrong or the price function is strictly convex in the trade volume for at least some volumes. In the above example the function gets linear for t>100. The min in the function is responsible for it being non-linear.


Regarding the second paragraph. If the function was really linear then averaging post-and pre-trade prices would give you exactly the area underneath the price difference function. I.e. the profit function as in Profit = (PD_PostTrade+PD_PreTrade)/2*Volume would be the antiderivative of the price difference function. This implies via the fundamental theorem of calculus that the price difference function is the derivative of the profit function. In particular the profit function can only be maximal, if the price difference is equal to zero. Therefore, you would not have a price inversion problem. Granted you do not differentiate continuously, but in a discrete way and currently do not search exactly for the optimum. Therefore, the volume would probably slightly overshoot the zero price difference mark. But this is not related to the function being strictly convex or linear.

Edit: Fixed a typo in the formula.

 

[elektrizikekswerk]

thats not exactly true. depending what you mean with "administrative fee", tuitions in germany are a state issue and I paid a modest(compared to US levels) tuition in Munich, Bavaria.

Sorry for a bit off topic here but I feel the need to reply here.

Spoiler: Offtopic

While true that there _were_ general tuition fees in some states in Germany they have been abandoned in 2014 (at latest). As they were only introduced in 2006, maybe you - like me - had the bad luck to study exactly in that time period.
There are still some exemptions for long timers and people who want to make a second degree in some states but in general for the first degree as full time student there are no tuition fees in Germany anymore - nowhere.

Studiengebühren in Deutschland - Studilux

Hier erfährst du wie hoch die Studiengebühren in Deutschland sowie welche Unterschiede es zwischen einem Erst-, Zweit- oder Langzeitstudium gibt.

www.studilux.de

/edit: And for something on topic: No comment on the teleporting generals issue from the dev team (fixing the workaround without fixing the bug)? Or did I accidently skip it?

 

[gkbba]

PD = price_I-price_E = 0,75((200-100-t)/(min(100+t,200)-(100-300+t)/min(200+t,300))=0,75((100-t)/(100+t)-(-100+t)/(200+t)) if 0=<t=<100.
This is definitely not linear in t!
In fact even in a single market the price is not linear in the traded volume for example in I we have
P_I(t) = 1+0,75((100-t)/(100+t))=1+0.75(-1+200/(100+t)) for 0=<t=<100. This is a constant plus a convex function in t, as 1/t is clearly a strictly convex function (on the positive half-axis).

are you sure you are reading the formula right? if it was min(buy,sell), it would just be 1+0.75(100-t)/100 which is a linear function clearly.

edit: edit, I am wrong. however I dont know if the wiki formula is correct. while not differentiable, you can solve the issue with two linear functions that meet at the base price in the equilibrium.

 

[gkbba]

Sorry for a bit off topic here but I feel the need to reply here.

Spoiler: Offtopic

While true that there _were_ general tuition fees in some states in Germany they have been abandoned in 2014 (at latest). As they were only introduced in 2006, maybe you - like me - had the bad luck to study exactly in that time period.
There are still some exemptions for long timers and people who want to make a second degree in some states but in general for the first degree as full time student there are no tuition fees in Germany anymore - nowhere.

Studiengebühren in Deutschland - Studilux

Hier erfährst du wie hoch die Studiengebühren in Deutschland sowie welche Unterschiede es zwischen einem Erst-, Zweit- oder Langzeitstudium gibt.

www.studilux.de

/edit: And for something on topic: No comment on the teleporting generals issue from the dev team (fixing the workaround without fixing the bug)? Or did I accidently skip it?

will answer in spoiler too:

Spoiler: spoiler here

yes, thanks you are right, I didnt know they changed it. however I am pretty sure you are wrong on the date. I paid tuition in 2015 in Bavaria on a full time first degree. maybe they decided it in 14 but it wasnt in effect in 15. anyways I stand corrected thanks.

 

[Tempscire]

are you sure you are reading the formula right? if it was min(buy,sell), it would just be 1+0.75(100-t)/100 which is a linear function clearly.

The market I has 200 buy orders and 100 sell orders without any trade. But when t goods are imported it has t additional sell orders, i.e. B_I=200, S_I=100+t and min(B_I,S_I)=100+t if 0=<t=<100. It is in fact min(buy,sell). It was a typo.

You can also take the easy example from the wiki to see that it is non-linear:

Here we have base price 20, buy=100 and sell=120. This results in a price of 17. With buy=120 we would have a price of 20. Therefore, by linearity we would need to have a price of 18.5 at buy=110.
But 1+0,75(110-120)/min(110,120)=1+0,75(-10/110)=1-3/44=41/44~0,932 and 41/44*20=410/22~18,64 is not equal to 18,5=37/2=407/22.

 

[gkbba]

The market I has 200 buy orders and 100 sell orders without any trade. But when t goods are imported it has t additional sell orders, i.e. B_I=200, S_I=100+t and min(B_I,S_I)=100+t if 0=<t=<100. It is in fact min(buy,sell). It was a typo.

yes you are right, I edited it as well. if the formula is correct its nonlinear, however as you can fit a piecewise linear function that meet each other at the base price for sell=buy, it might not be(?)

 

[Tempscire]

however as you can fit a piecewise linear function that meet each other at the base price for sell=buy, it might not be(?)

Not sure I understand what you are trying to say here. The formula in the wiki is convex and not piecewise linear. It has linear pieces, constant pieces and strictly convex pieces.

It would obviously be possible to use a pl (piecewise linear) price function, which would make the integration easier, but at least according to the wiki this is currently not the case.

Edit: And I would not worry about the function being differentiable. While it is clearly not in the points where the different pieces meet one can always take the right derivative in these points and should not have any problems, if one wants to optimize profits. Even with the wiki formula, one can derive a gradient-like optimization method which does not have a problem with these non-differentiable points. I posted it in another thread.

 

[Soranya]

Should they though? Significant tuition payments seem to be a post-WW2 development, and then mostly in the Anglosphere. German universities, for example, still remain almost free, with only administrative and public transit fees paid.

And cost of living (Rent, Utilities, Food), Something that often is included in tuition fees (at least rent/utilities) in the Anglossphere, is it not?

 

[MarkBrandenburg]

And cost of living (Rent, Utilities, Food), Something that often is included in tuition fees (at least rent/utilities) in the Anglossphere, is it not?

Yeah, they pay for good and services just like everyone else, not through the university. Public transit (at a discount) is often handled through the university though (or more precisely, through the student associations, but the university takes in the money along with admin fees), but not everywhere, and only for travel locally near the university. Some Länder don't do this and students have to buy normal, non-discounted public transit ticket if they need them.

 

[gkbba]

Not sure I understand what you are trying to say here. The formula in the wiki is convex and not piecewise linear. It has linear pieces, constant pieces and strictly convex pieces.

It would obviously be possible to use a pl (piecewise linear) price function, which would make the integration easier, but at least according to the wiki this is currently not the case.

I am trying to say, as you observed now as well, that the wiki formula might not be correct an you can fit a piecewise linear function that solve for the conditions talked about in this thread

I dont know why @lachek would say its linear if its clearly not, and since the formula originally comes from a reddit thread afaik, it might not be taken from the code but someone might have fitted it to observed prices.

cant access the wiki right now, but if the example is sourced by ingame data and not just putting in the respective numbers, then it just is not linear at all, yes.

 

[Gerulus Sum]

- The Ripper can no longer be a child or toddler

Could you introduce a game rule to disable the Ripper, "they shall not have dyed in vain" and other silly events? Abraham Lincoln turning out to be Jack the Ripper may be funny to some, but for a lot of players it's incredibly immersion-breaking.

 

[Cassilda]

Can't wait to play it

 

[aekkea]

I see that 1.1 will make minimum wage law somewhat more necessary for achieving high SoL. However, I believe currently minimum wage law simply increases the base wage, i.e. increases all wages by X%, which doesn't make sense. I'd expect this will actually set the minimum wage, or minimum base wage at least. Will it be fixed in 1.1?