Financial effect of start year

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PropH
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by PropH »

I think that you would get desyncs, if you try to join server which runs 170+ years.
Also, maybe if you define your setting with the flag SLF_NOT_IN_SAVE you (maybe) would be able to join servers. But i'm not sure.
P. S. They'll never include version with deleting into the trunk
Sorry for my "great" English
Baldy's Boss
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by Baldy's Boss »

lcd_47 wrote:The new setting is not client-based, so it would have to be saved in savegames. This means the savegame version number would have to be increased. Boom.

Deleting the line would work fine though. As I said, inflation forever and ever. :D
I really want to see inflation stop in a game...haven't reached 2051 from more than 170 years before yet,but working on it!
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by leifbk »

Baldy's Boss wrote:
leifbk wrote:
Baldy's Boss wrote:It sounds like my notion of starting a game in 1714 and building nothing but horse-wagons may be doomed to failure?
With inflation on, certainly yes. The running costs will eat up your income long before you have access to anything with a better profit margin. But it might be instructive to try it.

18th century transportation is quite a challenge. I typically have a company value of about 10-20 millions GBP in 1800, after 100 years of play and no inflation. That's puny, compared to what you may have after 100 years if you start in 1900. The situation in 1800 in my long Ships & RVs thread pointed to in my sig below, where the company value is a whopping 50 millions GBP in 1800, is rather untypical. In my current game, the starting year was 1801. It's now 1910, and the company value is approaching 150 millions. And I don't consider making money as a primary goal of the game. I mostly enjoy watching those tiny blotches moving back and forth on the screen.
The "Georgian Coach & Wagon Co." starting in 1714 (the year George I became King in Great Britain) would be intended to never build anything but horse wagons as long as it lasted,to see how long that would be...it sounds like you're saying it couldn't make it to when inflation stopped in 1884.(Green Victory Railroad,started in 1865 at the end of the USA's Civil War,doesn't run road vehicles but some competitors in 1931 still have horse wagons).
Hail King George, first of his name! As the first Hanoverian to ascend the British throne, he's also the direct ancestor of the ruling monarch of Great Britain, Her Majesty the Queen Elizabeth II. May his line never fail!

I wasn't entirely satisfied with my rejection of your idea. And as Eddi wrote:
Eddi wrote:let's put it this way: inflation increases costs faster than incomes, to around a factor of 5 after 170 years. so if a vehicle makes 5 times its running costs at the start of the game, that same vehicle will barely break even after 170 years.
I thought that it ... might ... just ... work. The 6-horse mail carriage of eGRVTS2 can, under fortunate circumstances, approach a 5:1 profit. So I set out and started a company in 1714, and lo and behold, by 1952 it's thriving. It's not big, but its finances are sound. I even got a fence around my shack, eventually.
pradtown.png
pradtown.png (290.84 KiB) Viewed 4012 times
I have performed the drudgery of a full financial report, year by year for the entire period 1714-1952, and it's attached here for your scrutiny. The column names are somewhat abbreviated, but should be self-evident for any OTTD player. The slight decline in income during the final years are due to over-capacity; some of the trams leave Sanville station only partially filled. I could have removed another tram, but really didn't care at that point.
pradtown.txt
(27.39 KiB) Downloaded 122 times
I thought it might be fitting to stop with the year 1952; it was the year of Her Majesty's coronation, and the very same year that yours humbly was born.

I could write an epic about this single-route company, but the point should be clear: It's not the size that matters. I generated a couple of dozen 128 by 128 maps until I found this gem: Two largish towns on an almost totally straight line, and a smaller town between them that gave me a lot of road for free. I have run this single mail route all the time, and it's (probably) the singularly most profitable route that can possibly be built on this map. You can't build yourself out of the strangulating conditions that set in after about 150 years. The wainsmiths and the oat-peddlers almost had the best of me, but the steam tram becoming available in 1860 saved me in the nick of time. I don't think that I would have made it, had I set out in 1700 instead of 1714.

The establishment of any other route, with a smaller profit margin, would eventually have failed and become a liability. One could of course invest like a maniac during the fat years, thus building up a larger fortune to meet the lean, ugly years with, and then shrink-to-fit when due, but it would probably be more hassle than it's worth. And for the experiment's sake, the purity of this setup eliminates a lot of irrelevant variables.

Here's a save file from 1720, when the route was set up, the carriages timetabled, and everything fine and dandy. There is only one newgrf loaded, the eGRVTS2. Town growth is turned off, as it would have been utterly pointless for most of the time span. The road is close to saturation by those 16 long equipages.
Pradtown Transport, 1720-01-01.sav
(31.5 KiB) Downloaded 111 times
The forum software tells me that I "Cannot add another attachment, 3 is the maximum" - so I stop there for now. If there's interest in the 1860 save file as well as the final 1953-01-01 status, I may post them later.

Thus, I have disproved my own statement, and I'm quite happy with that. But I don't think that I will turn inflation on again, ever.
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by lcd_47 »

leifbk wrote:If there's interest in the 1860 save file as well as the final 1953-01-01 status, I may post them later.
You definitely made me curious here. May I have a look at those please?
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by leifbk »

lcd_47 wrote:
leifbk wrote:If there's interest in the 1860 save file as well as the final 1953-01-01 status, I may post them later.
You definitely made me curious here. May I have a look at those please?
OK, here you go:
Pradtown Transport, 1860-01-01.sav
(35.75 KiB) Downloaded 108 times
Pradtown Transport, 1953-01-01.sav
(34.78 KiB) Downloaded 103 times
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by lcd_47 »

In 1860 there are banks next to your stations, you could diversify by refitting some carriages to valuables. :D
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by Transportman »

lcd_47 wrote:
Transportman wrote:Why would that be?
Because you need to persist the current inflation level across saves, rather than current prices?
But I still do not see why that would break multiplayer compatibility...
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leifbk
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by leifbk »

lcd_47 wrote:In 1860 there are banks next to your stations, you could diversify by refitting some carriages to valuables. :D
Yes there are banks; the Sanville one opened almost immediately, and I believe that the Pradtown bank opened about 1740. But the armored horse wagons only go up to 4 horses, and it would have required to convert all the 6-horse mail wagons to 4-horse ones. They don't have the required profit margin, and besides I believe that more horses on this route would have made the total throughput actually go down. As you can see, the settings include reduced breakdowns and mandatory depot service.

I don't know if the steam cargo trams can be refitted to valuables. Besides, in the period 1860-1920 the company was in deep s***, and in no position to venture into other branches of transportation. It's also good scientific procedure to keep the variables of an experiment to a minimum. So, I really didn't want to go beyond the single-route approach.

By 1950, the company is back in black, and should be ready to exploit whatever opportunities that might exist on this tiny map. There are lorries available with excellent profit margins. The next upgrade of the mail service would probably involve express mail trucks rather than trams.

There's one thing that I feel I could have done differently, namely the upgrade process 1890-1920 which got a suboptimal handling. But anyhow, I consider it proven that it's indeed possible to start a business in 1714 with a 2% inflation and only horse carriages and later road vehicles, and keep it alive until the modern age. And that was the whole point of the exercise.
Last edited by leifbk on 22 Jul 2016 22:54, edited 2 times in total.
lcd_47
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by lcd_47 »

Transportman wrote:But I still do not see why that would break multiplayer compatibility...
As I said:
lcd_47 wrote:The new setting is not client-based, so it would have to be saved in savegames. This means the savegame version number would have to be increased. Boom.
I'm referring to SAVEGAME_VERSION in saveload.cpp. However:
lcd_47 wrote:Deleting the line would work fine though.
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by Baldy's Boss »

leifbk wrote:
lcd_47 wrote:In 1860 there are banks next to your stations, you could diversify by refitting some carriages to valuables. :D
Yes there are banks; the Sanville one opened almost immediately, and I believe that the Pradtown bank opened about 1740. But the armored horse wagons only go up to 4 horses, and it would have required to convert all the 6-horse mail wagons to 4-horse ones. They don't have the required profit margin, and besides I believe that more horses on this route would have made the total throughput actually go down. As you can see, the settings include reduced breakdowns and mandatory depot service.

I don't know if the steam cargo trams can be refitted to valuables. Besides, in the period 1860-1920 the company was in deep s***, and in no position to venture into other branches of transportation. It's also good scientific procedure to keep the variables of an experiment to a minimum. So, I really didn't want to go beyond the single-route approach.

By 1950, the company is back in black, and should be ready to exploit whatever opportunities that might exist on this tiny map. There are lorries available with excellent profit margins. The next upgrade of the mail service would probably involve express mail trucks rather than trams.

There's one thing that I feel I could have done differently, namely the upgrade process 1890-1920 which got a suboptimal handling. But anyhow, I consider it proven that it's indeed possible to start a business in 1714 with a 2% inflation and only horse carriages and later road vehicles, and keep it alive until the modern age. And that was the whole point of the exercise.

So my cited constraint of nothing but horse carriages would indeed be suicidal if steam trams are essential to survival.
(Incidentally George II was the last British monarch crowned in the year of accession,the Queen,reigning since February 6th `1952,was crowned June 2nd 1953).
Would larger maps make things easier or harder?
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by Transportman »

lcd_47 wrote:
Transportman wrote:But I still do not see why that would break multiplayer compatibility...
As I said:
lcd_47 wrote:The new setting is not client-based, so it would have to be saved in savegames. This means the savegame version number would have to be increased. Boom.
I'm referring to SAVEGAME_VERSION in saveload.cpp. However:
lcd_47 wrote:Deleting the line would work fine though.
I still don't see how one (changing the SAVEGAME_VERSION) is related to the other (breaking multiplayer compatibility). And I don't think it is the first time it would be increased and never heard any problems with that, which is the reason I don't see the relation between the two.
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by leifbk »

Baldy's Boss wrote:So my cited constraint of nothing but horse carriages would indeed be suicidal if steam trams are essential to survival.
Yes, indeed. In the last normal year (just the usual running costs) of the horse period, in 1859, the company had a Total of -21,149. It would only go worse from there until 1884, and the company would have been lost before 1900.

The 6-horse carriages are expensive, and the price goes through the roof with inflation on. The next horse carriage renewal, due in 1862-63, would have cost the company more than 600,000. Note that the balance in 1859 was 647,033, which would by then have been totally lost. You could never have raised that kind of money again.
Baldy's Boss wrote:Would larger maps make things easier or harder?
I don't think that it matters. The only way a larger map could help you, would be to build up several of the same kind of optimal routes early, but then you'd lose even more after the profit went negative around 1840. Note that the route was carefully selected after generating a lot of maps. You won't find a route giving this kind of ROI on many a big map. So, more routes would most probably only aggravate the situation.
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by PropH »

lcd_47 wrote:
Transportman wrote:But I still do not see why that would break multiplayer compatibility...
As I said:
lcd_47 wrote:The new setting is not client-based, so it would have to be saved in savegames. This means the savegame version number would have to be increased. Boom.
I'm referring to SAVEGAME_VERSION in saveload.cpp. However:
lcd_47 wrote:Deleting the line would work fine though.
Someone should test, but deleting that line will kill inflation at all, and it's worst way.
I think if we set this flag(in settings.ini)
[+] Spoiler
SLF_NO_NETWORK_SYNC - do not synchronize over network (but it is saved if SLF_NOT_IN_SAVE is not set
And this
[+] Spoiler
SGF_NO_NETWORK - this setting does not apply to network games; it may not be changed during the game
And also default value will be false, it would be totally compatible with trunk
So specification would be look like that:

Code: Select all

[SDT_VAR]
base     = GameSettings
var      = economy.no_time_limit_inflation
from     = 196
to       = SL_MAX_VERSION
flags    = SLF_NOT_IN_SAVE | SLF_NO_NETWORK_SYNC
guiflags = SGF_NO_NETWORK
def      = false
str      = STR_CONFIG_SETTING_NO_TIME_LIMIT_INFLATION
strhelp  = STR_CONFIG_SETTING_NO_TIME_LIMIT_INFLATION_HELP_TEXT 
Sorry for my "great" English
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by leifbk »

Baldy's Boss wrote:The "Georgian Coach & Wagon Co." starting in 1714 (the year George I became King in Great Britain) would be intended to never build anything but horse carriages as long as it lasted,to see how long that would be...it sounds like you're saying it couldn't make it to when inflation stopped in 1884.(Green Victory Railroad,started in 1865 at the end of the USA's Civil War,doesn't run road vehicles but some competitors in 1931 still have horse carriages).
Buddy, it seems like you can have your "Georgian Coach & Wagon Co." after all. The strategy is a bit counter-intuitive, at least to me.

I just couldn't let go of the idea, so I started to rethink the scenario. What's really killing the economy, is the vehicle maintenance. They sure eat a lot of hay, them horsies. So, I went back to 1714 and started over with 20 4-horse mail carriages. They started out with a slightly smaller net income, but the situation actually improved over the years. As the devastating effects of the inflation approached maximum, even these carriages eventually started to lose money around 1860.

Rather than going back to start, I saved the game, and swapped my 20 4-horse carriages for 26 2-horse carriages. They have each only half the running cost of the 4-horse carriage. They continued to make a profit, but still not sufficient to pay for their own renewal costs. This is the crucial point: If your total net income over the vehicles' lifetime can't pay for their regular renewal, the company will eventually be lost.

Here is a table of the 2-, 4-, and 6-horse carriages with speed, cost and annual running cost after inflation's end:

Code: Select all

Name                Speed       Cost     Annual RC
2 horse carriage    20 km/h     £31,265     £2,858
4 horse carriage    26 km/h     £51,588     £5,717
6 horse carriage    32 km/h     £71,911     £8,575
In 1876 the 2-horse mail carriages still made money, but not quite enough. So I finally decided to go with lcd_47's idea after all:
lcd_47 wrote:In 1860 there are banks next to your stations, you could diversify by refitting some carriages to valuables. :D
I bought 26 armoured 2-horse carriages, copied the order list over from the mail carriages, and let them loose. The income sky-rocketed. By 1887 I added another 4 armoured carriages. With 56 2-horse carriages, the company's financial situation finally appears sustainable.

The 2-horse carriages (both mail and armoured) now cost £31,265 each, and have a lifespan of 25 years. Thus, the company's annual net income per carriage will have to be above £31,265 / 25 = £1,250.6. With 56 carriages, the annual net income must surpass £70,033.6, which it now does by a very safe margin.

To maximise the profit, it might now be wise to discontinue the mail service, but I'm just not that hard-nosed about it. As long as the company seems able to make money indefinitely - or at least until a bank goes out of business - it's all right with me.

So, once again we have a story about how the lowly prevail where the mighty have fallen. You don't win this kind of game with high profits, but with low running costs.

I conclude with a savegame of 1st January 1902 and the financial results for 1901, with the obvious reference to British royalty and the end of an era. The previous year's new vehicle costs reflect the partial renewal of the armoured carriages.
pradtown2.png
pradtown2.png (292.05 KiB) Viewed 3874 times
Attachments
Pradtown 2-horse Transport, 1902-01-01.sav
(38.4 KiB) Downloaded 99 times
Baldy's Boss
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by Baldy's Boss »

I note that the latter game owns far fewer road tiles.How was this minimized?
(1714-1901 are indeed the bounds of the Hanoverian dynasty).

Are you playing solo rather than competing with AIs?
I think that the final hurdle is dealing with the declining availability & reliability of horse wagons as time goes on...I have always assumed to actually reach 2051 would be impossible.
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by leifbk »

Baldy's Boss wrote:I note that the latter game owns far fewer road tiles.How was this minimized?
I hadn't noticed that. I haven't done any changes in the number of road tiles, but I had to add another "catchment enlarger" station at the Sanville end because the bank this time took away too much of the mail. I also had to demolish a house and add a depot in Sanville as the roundtrip became too long for the slow 2-horse vehicles. As you can see, I don't have infrastructure costs enabled, and the basic infrastructure costs (afaik a fixed price per station) are exactly the same in the two images. This may be a bug.
Baldy's Boss wrote:Are you playing solo rather than competing with AIs?
No AIs, just playing solo.
Baldy's Boss wrote:I think that the final hurdle is dealing with the declining availability & reliability of horse wagons as time goes on...I have always assumed to actually reach 2051 would be impossible.
In this game just before 1900 I changed to option "Vehicles never expire", and then issued the console command "resetengines". This should ensure that horse carriages stay available and reasonably reliable until the end of time.
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by Baldy's Boss »

leifbk wrote:
Baldy's Boss wrote:I note that the latter game owns far fewer road tiles.How was this minimized?
I hadn't noticed that. I haven't done any changes in the number of road tiles, but I had to add another "catchment enlarger" station at the Sanville end because the bank this time took away too much of the mail. I also had to demolish a house and add a depot in Sanville as the roundtrip became too long for the slow 2-horse vehicles. As you can see, I don't have infrastructure costs enabled, and the basic infrastructure costs (afaik a fixed price per station) are exactly the same in the two images. This may be a bug.
Baldy's Boss wrote:Are you playing solo rather than competing with AIs?
No AIs, just playing solo.
Baldy's Boss wrote:I think that the final hurdle is dealing with the declining availability & reliability of horse wagons as time goes on...I have always assumed to actually reach 2051 would be impossible.
In this game just before 1900 I changed to option "Vehicles never expire", and then issued the console command "resetengines". This should ensure that horse carriages stay available and reasonably reliable until the end of time.
OK,so under the parameters under which I have been playing,survival remains impossible.
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by leifbk »

Baldy's Boss wrote:OK,so under the parameters under which I have been playing,survival remains impossible.
Why? Are you thinking of infrastructure costs? Those are growing over-proportional to the company's network size. In this tiny network it should hardly make any difference.

As for AIs, I doubt if any would survive the first 100 years under these conditions :)
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by Baldy's Boss »

leifbk wrote:
Baldy's Boss wrote:OK,so under the parameters under which I have been playing,survival remains impossible.
Why? Are you thinking of infrastructure costs? Those are growing over-proportional to the company's network size. In this tiny network it should hardly make any difference.

As for AIs, I doubt if any would survive the first 100 years under these conditions :)
I play with infrastructures on,normal breakdowns,AIs present,and vehicles expiring as designed.
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Re: Financial effect of start year

Post by Eddi »

leifbk wrote:In this game just before 1900 I changed to option "Vehicles never expire", and then issued the console command "resetengines". This should ensure that horse carriages stay available and reasonably reliable until the end of time.
you don't actually need "resetengines" after you enable "vehicles never expire". it will snapshot the current vehicles (and their reliability). you only need "resetengines" if the vehicles were already retired (or their reliability already started to drop at the end of their lifecycle), to bring them back.
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