Local authorities - proposals, survey

[LaChupacabra]

I would have a suggestion on how local authorities evaluate specified actions of players. This is an continuation of the Local Authorities theme started by L. Spooner Inc, but due to the extension to different ideas, I preferred to start a separate thread.

First of all, the proposed changes would aim to emphasize the different attitudes of local authorities depending on the selected setting - now these differences are so small that you can hardly see any differences between the settings. Besides, I would like to propose adding the influence of other actions of the player on his assessment - equating entire mountains, flooding the map, destroying someone else's vehicles, or even advertising campaigns currently don't have any, even the slightest impact on the rating, but it would be good if they did.

A few tables and a description of them below

This is the current impact of the player's actions on his assessment by local authorities. The elements that have no influence are marked in blue.

Local aut - current.PNG (43.59 KiB) Viewed 2019 times

This is how it could look the expanded influence of a player's actions on his rating in the city. New elements are marked with blue.

Local aut - new.PNG (52.12 KiB) Viewed 2019 times

The rating of local authorities could have an impact on the costs of the player's actions - the worse the rating, the higher the costs.

Local aut - cost.PNG (24.98 KiB) Viewed 2019 times

List of proposed changes:
1. More variation in impact for different settings
Setting the influence of local authorities in fact doesn't work at the moment - the differences are almost imperceptible, as they concern a small part of the actions that the player can take. With a change to the permissive setting, the player would have a lot of freedom to build, the neutral option would be the closest to the current state, while the hostile setting would indeed be quite restrictive and good for those players who like more difficult conditions. Considering all the changes, adding a friendly (almost unrestricted) and unwilling (better than hostile) settings would also be useful.

2. Reducing the impact of logging trees on the rating
It is now far too big. It is enough to build a road only 21 tiles long for the city to prevent any activity not only in the city but also in its vicinity. As a result, after the route is built, the player no longer has the option to build any station - this limitation can last even more than 13 years! In contrast, leveling or flooding the entire map will not produce any reaction.

3. Addition of the influence of over-equation, land sinking on the rating
Currently, it is possible to level or even flood the entire map, and if no trees are touched, city officials will still be very happy. As a result, the element of local authorities that was supposed to limit abuse by some players often doesn't work at all.

4. Preventing environmental changes when the company has a very low rating
In more restrictive settings (hostile, unwilling and maybe neutral), a low company rating could prevent the player from making terrain changes.

5. Adding compensation as an alternative to a bribe
Compensation could be an alternative to a bribe, but could only raise the rating to a level sufficient to build a station - unlike a bribe, it would not have the option of demolishing a city.

6. Cost of bribe / compensation depending on the company's assets
Currently, the cost of a bribe, regardless of the company's wealth, is the same - very high at first and less and less significant over time. The bribe costs would consist of a fixed not very high base + an additional amount corresponding to a certain proportion of goodwill. Perhaps these proposed costs could be lower, but overall it seems to me that some link between the prosperity of the company and the cost of bribes would make sense.

7. Adding the impact of the assessment on the costs of the company's operations
Currently, the rating of the company has no impact on the costs of its activities. I think it would be interesting if it were otherwise and the costs of some of the company's activities were related to its evaluation.

8. Adding the positive impact of the presence of a company statute
Currently, the statute only affects the rating of transport at stations. It would not be pointless if it also influenced the company's rating in the city. It would be a passive influence - thanks to the statute, a possible lower rating would return to a neutral level faster.

9. Possibility of extending the advertising time
Advertisements allow you to temporarily increase the rating of transport at stations within the reach of local authorities. Currently, using an ad has a one-time effect - it only increases the rating by a certain amount once. After the change, each purchase of advertising would extend the period of its impact by a month, up to a maximum of 12 months, or even without limitation. However, each subsequent purchase of advertising would be more and more expensive - for good reason: you pay for the convenience. The cost of advertising could also be related to the production volume within the city.

10. Increasing the default range of influence of local authorities
On the one hand, thanks to this, advertisements would have a greater reach, on the other hand, cities could also restrict the activities of poorly rated companies to a greater extent. Currently, the reach of local authorities is 20 fields from the city center. I would suggest 50. A good solution could also be to extend the range by at least 5 fields from each city building - it would be useful for the largest cities.

11. Improvement of sclerosis of local authorities
Today, local authorities are remarkably memorable. If the rating goes down to the lowest level of -1000 points (it is enough to inadvertently build a railway next to the city), being unable to do anything, the player must wait even more than 13 years, or almost 3 hours, to be able to build anything near the city! The reason is that each month the evaluation is automatically awarded by only 5 points! I would suggest 50 for a permissive setting and 20 for a neutral setting. Hostile would remain hostile.

Edit: I forgot to describe one more point ...
13. Accidents at railway crossings influencing the company's assessment
Here, negative points would go to the company that built the railroad crossing, i.e. the company that built the tracks on the road, or vice versa: the road on the tracks. The company that built the railway is not always to blame for accidents. In order for the guilty party to be recognized, each railway crossing would have to have information about which came first: tracks or road. Causing each successive accident within a short period of time could increase the penalty x2. It could also be a financial penalty: 110% of the vehicle price (to the account of the injured company) + € 10,000 for each victim + 1% of the company's assets for the accident itself.

[jfs]

I'm not opposed to these ideas.

Some thoughts, not everything might be feasible:

Perhaps make towns consider the age of the company, total size of the company, and size of the company's presence in/near the town for things. Keep track of the company's presence (amount of owned tiles of various types) in the town across several years. Keep track of the company's environmental modifications across several years.
A small company might get more leniency than a large company. A company with large active operations in the town might get extra goodwill, but large passive operations (like a railroad track just going past without a station) might be disliked.

Maybe consider owned but unused land negatively. ("This company just bought up a bunch of land five years ago and haven't done anything with it!")

Instead of considering service interval of stations (time since last vehicle visit) consider the station rating. It largely reflect the same thing, and it would effectively mean that advertising campaigns in the long run also had an effect on town rating, without adding in the advertising directly.
This would need to be combined with a feature to manually shut down service of specific cargo types at a station, such that if you e.g. stop valuables service at one station, it won't have a negative impact on town rating as long as you officially announced it.

Somehow make the effect of destruction on the ability to build stations slightly delayed. So you could e.g. remove a bunch of roads and buildings, but if you built a station in their place quickly after the town would be more likely to see the destruction as "justified". However then that station would probably have to be "jinxed", if you don't begin servicing it soon, or if you destroy it before starting service, the town would become even more negative towards you than if you'd done nothing.

[LaChupacabra]

Perhaps make towns consider the age of the company, total size of the company, and size of the company's presence in/near the town for things. Keep track of the company's presence (amount of owned tiles of various types) in the town across several years. Keep track of the company's environmental modifications across several years.
A small company might get more leniency than a large company.

I am not convinced that small and especially new companies should be treated more leniently. You always have to remember about trolling and destroying the game for other players, and this is usually done by frustrated people who have small companies and are unable to play, or even they set up new companies just to tease someone.
With such a comprehensive check of the company's activities, the problem could also be the limited performance of players' computers. The game even without it can be very hardware demanding. Another problem could be players' understanding of this complex conditioning.

Apropos to trolling, I forgot to describe one more point ...
13. Accidents at railway crossings influencing the company's assessment
Here, negative points would go to the company that built the railroad crossing, i.e. the company that built the tracks on the road, or vice versa: the road on the tracks. The company that built the railway is not always to blame for accidents. In order for the guilty party to be recognized, each railway crossing would have to have information about which came first: tracks or road. Causing each successive accident within a short period of time could increase the penalty x2. It could also be a financial penalty: 110% of the vehicle price (to the account of the injured company) + € 10,000 for each victim + 1% of the company's assets for the accident itself.

...large passive operations (like a railroad track just going past without a station) might be disliked.

A company's infrastructure that would be negatively affected by mere presence is not a good idea. The company pays for its maintenance, so also for the property tax - a city next to a private railway line earns on it, so why should local authorities be angry about this fact? For example, I will say that there is a small village near my city, much more than half of the budget of which comes from fees for using the fairway located on its territory.
If the presence of the infrastructure itself had a negative impact on the rating and prevented further development, this mechanism would force the player to take actions that he may not want to do. It would be very annoying, because why someone who wants to create a large steel production network (especially in an online game where he has limited time) already serves dozens of enterprises with several hundred trains would additionally deal with some poor bus connections in all of them (even several hundred!) cities next to its railroads?

Maybe consider owned but unused land negatively. ("This company just bought up a bunch of land five years ago and haven't done anything with it!")

I had an idea that the purchase of land would be limited in time - e.g. after 2-5 years the field would become open to the public again. But then what about tracks, roads or objects? The game checking what has been used recently and saving such information could further limit game performance - I'm not sure if it's worth it.

Instead of considering service interval of stations (time since last vehicle visit) consider the station rating.

Initially, I would say it's a good idea. But how would stations that only receive payload be rated? Here's the problem.

Somehow make the effect of destruction on the ability to build stations slightly delayed. So you could e.g. remove a bunch of roads and buildings, but if you built a station in their place quickly after the town would be more likely to see the destruction as "justified". However then that station would probably have to be "jinxed", if you don't begin servicing it soon, or if you destroy it before starting service, the town would become even more negative towards you than if you'd done nothing.

Possibility of demolishing buildings with impunity? The trolls are already crying with delight. They won't build a station, they'll just destroy more. Or ... they destroy buildings, they build a station, then they destroy buildings again and they build a station, and so on several times. In the end, they will remove all stations and the city will be gone.
I would have another idea here: that the city could not build on bare ground - very often removing the building to make room for the station, a new one will appear in its place in a moment. Sometimes a new building is erected in less than a second after the site has been cleared! The next time you try, the same thing again ... and you can't build a station anymore because the rating dropped. I think (hopefully) this is a simple mechanism but would be very helpful.

[odisseus]

I think the cost of bribes should depend on the size of town, not the size of company. In smaller towns, there are hardly any sources of income, and the officials would be happy to receive just about any "contribution". Conversely, in a larger city, there (presumably) are a lot of businesses, so the corrupt official must have many potential sources of bribes, and he also faces greater repercussions if he gets caught.

Similarly, the cost of purchasing land should depend on the distance to the nearest town centre, and on the population of that town. The land in the middle of a big city must be extremely expensive, because there would be a lot of bidders for it (such as housing developers). On the other hand, land far away from any town, especially "bad" land like desert or snowfields, could even be free.

Purchasing land should give a one-time boost to the company rating (because it's money to the town budget!), but leaving that land idle should decrease the rating every month (because the town is unhappy when the land is not used for anything at all). Hopefully this would prevent the players from reserving huge blocks of land for future airports.

The penalty for a crash on a road-rail crossing should always affect the owner of the rail, regardless of who built first and who owns the road. Otherwise, the trolls would use town-owned roads to destroy competitors' buses without consequences.

I would have another idea here: that the city could not build on bare ground

I totally support this. How many times have I deleted an airport with intention of replacing it with a larger one, only to find out that the town has built a house where my old airport stood a minute ago.

[LaChupacabra]

I think the cost of bribes should depend on the size of town, not the size of company.

Yes, the size of the city would be a better benchmark for the size of the bribe. But not always either. What about a big city and a small company that accidentally mowed a few trees? It would be good to consider both, but if only one, it would be better to consider the size of the city.

Similarly, the cost of purchasing land should depend on the distance to the nearest town centre, and on the population of that town.

Also a good idea. Although it may not be the cost of buying the land, but the cost of cleaning the land (which also includes building anything), it should depend on the size of the city and proximity to the center. It should also be remembered that apart from purchasing the land, you can use objects, tracks, canals and even stations to reserve the land.

Purchasing land should give a one-time boost to the company rating (because it's money to the town budget!), but leaving that land idle should decrease the rating every month (because the town is unhappy when the land is not used for anything at all). Hopefully this would prevent the players from reserving huge blocks of land for future airports.

It would be the wrong way. Such a mechanism would be like feed for dishonest and unthinking players, and would in no way prevent the buyout of large areas, because before the rating dropped, player would have time to buy whatever he likes. All the more so if the land purchase were to be positively assessed.

The penalty for a crash on a road-rail crossing should always affect the owner of the rail, regardless of who built first and who owns the road.

Many times I had a situation where someone mindless on my tracks built their road. Sometimes I could build a bridge, but when that road was right next to the station, I couldn't do anything. Bearing the consequences of someone else's stupidity or even malicious actions would not be a good solution. Therefore, it is important here that the game has information about who built on who.

Otherwise, the trolls would use town-owned roads to destroy competitors' buses without consequences.

Players cannot build city roads - these will always be their roads and it is they who would bear the costs and responsibility for accidents by building level crossing on someone else's tracks.

[odisseus]

What about a big city and a small company that accidentally mowed a few trees?

A small company wouldn't have the money to pay bribes anyway. If you have angered the city authorities while being short on cash, that's your problem. Go build somewhere else.

It should also be remembered that apart from purchasing the land, you can use objects, tracks, canals and even stations to reserve the land.

Building a track or road doesn't give you exclusive ownership of the tile, as another player can still build a crossing or a bus stop over it. Building a canal or a station is already quite expensive, so we can say it includes the cost of purchasing the land under it. (By the way, I thought that the land purchase cost is paid when building any object, but that's not the case). Conversely, just clearing a tile doesn't give the player any control over it, and I don't think the cost of this action should depend on the surroundings.

Regarding land reservations, I think they are okay if they are actually used shortly after the reservation is made. For example, after buying a 6x6 block for an airport, the player should still be able to build that airport. He might even receive a rating boost from a town that anticipates the improvement in transportation. However, if the player reserves that block and builds nothing, his rating should drop fast enough to make that purchase useless in a few years.

[Eddi]

i was always of the opinion that preventing landscaping (including clearing tiles) when rating is low is the primary way to solve the tree-rating-exploit. (second thing in this line of thought would be to make it less of an issue to run into a situation where you would even need the tree exploit)

[LaChupacabra]

i was always of the opinion that preventing landscaping (including clearing tiles) when rating is low is the primary way to solve the tree-rating-exploit. (second thing in this line of thought would be to make it less of an issue to run into a situation where you would even need the tree exploit)

I'm not sure if I understand you, but...
Introducing blocking a player's actions (including altitude changes or even clearing a tiles) when the rating is low may make sense, but without other changes (e.g. reducing the impact of removing trees) it would be like a shoot oneself in the foot. This would not solve the problem of trees, but it would make the problem even worse. Currently, it is enough to clean only 20 (not 21, as I wrote earlier) tiles with trees to prevent any activity in the city or even its vicinity. Currently it is very easy to ruin your rating quite by accident. The only reasonable solution for the player in this situation is to clear an even larger area (which he did not want to do, but has no choice) and plant new trees there. It looks weak and makes no sense, but if this exploit were to be removed, the game would be extremely frustrating, as the player could not do anything for several hours and for practically no good reason.

Oops!
Currently, it is enough to build a modest line quite away from the city, which only minimally affects the reach of local authorities - this is enough to ruin your assessment and prevent you from operating in the city zone.

treecutofobia.png (118.98 KiB) Viewed 1837 times

After several years...
Often, the city will not allow the construction of a station for even a dozen or so years, just because the player once built a railway line away from the city...

chronic treecutofobia.png (110.42 KiB) Viewed 1837 times

If a player commits crimes against humanity, i.e. builds a railway first, and only then wants to build a station, the local authorities will never forgive him!
Right now, whatever you'd like to do in town, you have to build a station first, then a railroad, road or whatever - this can be tedious, but there's no other way, because any construction instantly destroys the rating.
Additionally, if the station label is not near the city buildings, regardless of the rating of the station and how often you operate it, the appaling rating you will get after the line is built will be valid for the next several years. During this time, you can forget about any station expansion.

[Eddi]

Introducing blocking a player's actions (including altitude changes or even clearing a tiles) when the rating is low may make sense, but without other changes (e.g. reducing the impact of removing trees) it would be like a shoot oneself in the foot. This would not solve the problem of trees, but it would make the problem even worse. Currently, it is enough to clean only 20 (not 21, as I wrote earlier) tiles with trees to prevent any activity in the city or even its vicinity. Currently it is very easy to ruin your rating quite by accident. The only reasonable solution for the player in this situation is to clear an even larger area (which he did not want to do, but has no choice) and plant new trees there. It looks weak and makes no sense, but if this exploit were to be removed, the game would be extremely frustrating, as the player could not do anything for several hours and for practically no good reason.

yes, all of those points are correct. what i meant was: remove the tree exploit first, and then rebalance the rest.