Roads cost, an example on empire size comparative advantage equalizer

[IsaacCAT]

Preface: @MohawkWolfo98 post about money concerns in 2.0 has made me think about comparative advantage due to empire size.

Observation: now building a road has a fixed cost of 50 money units plus +120,00% army maintenance while the army is building the road. This increased maintenance for the army implies an increased cost for roads in territories with increased movement cost. However, there is no maintenance after building the road and the 50 money units is very high tag for small countries.

Suggestion: roads should reduce its fixed cost and incorporate a monthly maintenance cost depending on the terrain. Roads not maintained will loose their bonuses and after 50 years without maintenance they will disappear. Roads maintenance will use a new slot in the Economy section.

How:

The fixed cost will be 20 money units

The variable cost will be the +120,00% army maintenance while building the road plus the following maintenance costs per month depending on the terrain:

• Farmland or plains: -0.1 money units / month
• Hills or forests: -0.2 money units / month
• Mountains or jungles: -0.3 money units / month
• Deserts or marsh: -0.4 money units / month

As an example, we can compare a one province empire and a three province nation cost of road network per city. We calculate the accumulated costs to build a road network between major cities after 10 years as follows:

Empire A: one province, three cities, roads built in four territories connecting the three cities:

• Fixed costs: 20 x 4 = 80
• Variable costs
  • army building: 4 x 4 = 16
  • maintenance cost per 10 years: 120 months x (0.1 x 2 + 0.2 x 1 + 0.3 x 1) = 84

Total costs road network after 10 years = 180. Total cost road network per city after 10 years = 60 / city

Empire B: three provinces, seven cities, roads built in thirteen territories connecting the seven cities:

• Fixed costs: 20 x 13 = 260
• Variable costs
  • army building: 4 x 13 = 52
  • maintenance cost per 10 years: 120 months x (0.1 x 5 + 0.2 x 3 + 0.3 x 3 + 0.4 x 2) = 336

Total costs road network after 10 years = 648. Total cost road network per city after 10 years = 92 / city

As you can see, the larger contributor to the differential between a large and small empire is the maintenance cost. It is working as an equalizer.

When the player decides to stop maintenance on roads, the bonuses lost will be the territory bonuses:

• +0.001% Monthly Civilization Change
• +2.5% Pop Conversion Speed
• +2.5% Pop Assimilation Speed
• +2.5% Pop Promotion Speed
• +1% Pop Demotion Speed
• +0.05 Migration Attraction
• +0.05 Pop Migration Speed
• +0.05% Local Base Trade Routes Modifier

However, the movement cost bonus of 50% will remain while there is a road.

 

[IsaacCAT]

In the suggestion forum, use the voting arrows in the opening post to upvote the suggestion.

Like, agree and others will not upvote the suggestion here.

 

[Jiben]

Never thought of it but hard agree. It may also make me "just" build important roads and not roads everywhere. Althought i must admit my kneejerk reaction says the proposed upkeep numbers are too high but i guess we lose our goldsink in 2.0 so unsure.

 

[IsaacCAT]

Never thought of it but hard agree. It may also make me "just" build important roads and not roads everywhere. Althought i must admit my kneejerk reaction says the proposed upkeep numbers are too high but i guess we lose our goldsink in 2.0 so unsure.

Thank you!

Numbers are not definitive ofc.

 

[IsaacCAT]

From this morning run, this is what an ancient road without maintenance looks like:

 

[Rabid]

I like this suggestion, building roads should definitely be cheaper but keeping them working should be expensive.

 

[IsaacCAT]

The cost for road maintence shoud be substracted on the provincial level. This way if the province is on deficit, roads will start the countdown to disappear due to lack of maintenance.

If the player wants to keep the roads in a deficitary province there will be two options:

• Develop the province to have enough income to maintain the roads
• Rebuild the roads every 50 years

This way, roads built in deserts will disappear faster than roads built in greenlands.

 

[Nominus]

The cost for road maintence shoud be substracted on the provincial level. This way if the province is on deficit, roads will start the countdown to disappear due to lack of maintenance.

If the player wants to keep the roads in a deficitary province there will be two options:

• Develop the province to have enough income to maintain the roads
• Rebuild the roads every 50 years

This way, roads built in deserts will disappear faster than roads built in greenlands.

Genius idea!
But I think roads would need a buff for that, e.g. increase diplomatic range and increase mercantile value in every territory connected to it.

 

[Don Wing]

I have to Disagree

Roads, paved ones representing in game had to be expensive ( perhaps even more expensive) and the maintenanace should keep at zero as this is, why:

ROAD PRICE: there is a reason why almost nobody exept romans built paved country road, because they were a logistical nightmare for all civilization until XIX Century, that´s why almost no road after Rome was paved cross-country until then.

ROME in game has the Roman bonus reduction cost, plus using engineers, etc it could cost a mere 10$ worth building, wich is truly cheap, this represent the ability of rome to make roads and build them across the empire with great effect and efficiency.

COMPARING PRICE: a marketplace/library/granary cost 100, double than standard road... do you know how many stone, sand, gravel, is required to build a mile of a paved road... plus the logistical of moving material depots, labor encampment, wood, etc every few miles... the "average" road in game has 30 miles long ( some are longer)... thats a lot of stone and material, clearing, leveling... much more in ancient times... much more expensive than build a market or granay... not mentioning building through hills, forests, deserts, mountains, swamps... ( cost should be higher )

Of course the extra soldier payment and the fact that using soldier as labor could minimise price, but we have to compare between buildings. Roads should cost 100 and 125 to 200 in rought terraing!

That´s why almost no one buitthem, and only rome succeded in quality and quantity.

MAINTENEANCE: well, no building in game (exept forts) require mainteneance, so for game reason I recommend not to add this cost.

Also in history, the road mainteneance was almos null, they were built to avoid this factor ( same as the stone bridges)
Regardless of that, the maintenance required, most cutting trees and clean man-made obstuctions was in charge of the local autorities, not the central one (wich in game represent the player)

Many more things too add, but is getting log, anyway Im available to continue with this discussion.

 

[IsaacCAT]

I have to Disagree

Roads, paved ones representing in game had to be expensive ( perhaps even more expensive) and the maintenanace should keep at zero as this is, why:

ROAD PRICE: there is a reason why almost nobody exept romans built paved country road, because they were a logistical nightmare for all civilization until XIX Century, that´s why almost no road after Rome was paved cross-country until then.

ROME in game has the Roman bonus reduction cost, plus using engineers, etc it could cost a mere 10$ worth building, wich is truly cheap, this represent the ability of rome to make roads and build them across the empire with great effect and efficiency.

COMPARING PRICE: a marketplace/library/granary cost 100, double than standard road... do you know how many stone, sand, gravel, is required to build a mile of a paved road... plus the logistical of moving material depots, labor encampment, wood, etc every few miles... the "average" road in game has 30 miles long ( some are longer)... thats a lot of stone and material, clearing, leveling... much more in ancient times... much more expensive than build a market or granay... not mentioning building through hills, forests, deserts, mountains, swamps... ( cost should be higher )

Of course the extra soldier payment and the fact that using soldier as labor could minimise price, but we have to compare between buildings. Roads should cost 100 and 125 to 200 in rought terraing!

That´s why almost no one buitthem, and only rome succeded in quality and quantity.

MAINTENEANCE: well, no building in game (exept forts) require mainteneance, so for game reason I recommend not to add this cost.

Also in history, the road mainteneance was almos null, they were built to avoid this factor ( same as the stone bridges)
Regardless of that, the maintenance required, most cutting trees and clean man-made obstuctions was in charge of the local autorities, not the central one (wich in game represent the player)

Many more things too add, but is getting log, anyway Im available to continue with this discussion.

This suggestion is pre 2.0 when roads did not have a discounted price.

I am not against your historical point. My suggestion was to introduce an equalizer between small and big empires.

On the maintenace by local authorities we could use the maintenance on provincial level as I suggested on this thread post of the 26 of april.

I will try to find a source for maintenace works on roads:

“However, the maintenance was left to the province and to local magistrates. The landowners were also asked to contribute to the repair of any road passing through their land (usually by paying 50% of the cost)” Romae Vitam

It seems the Romans used Etruscans and Carthage road technologies and improved them with new inventions to make them more robust and durable. But that does not mean were maintenance free. Further reading is necessary.