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[Salmeuk]

I think everyone needs to stop waving their cocks around and put them back in their trousers.

Somewhere along the way the line got drawn between "Realism" and "Fun", with S/D on the former and, uh, the other side on the latter.

What? I personally believe that even though S/D may not be realistic (don't fucking think about skewering me for that)enough or that it may be too realistic, we shouldn't make this decision based on a sense of Earth, but of the Fantasy world.

Anyone else consider an emergent economic system? Where the game develops different super-genius theorists who think up different ways of the economy functioning? Or maybe where there's a set number of models, that different civilizations use?

Squirreloid, welcome to the forums, and try to not be so reactionary. You don't get anywhere like that.

I have to say though, I think were lucky this is a flame war about economic theory within a video game, and not some unimportant and irrelevant topic like religion or politics.

[Squirrelloid]

...we shouldn't make this decision based on a sense of Earth, but of the Fantasy world.

Anyone else consider an emergent economic system? Where the game develops different super-genius theorists who think up different ways of the economy functioning? Or maybe where there's a set number of models, that different civilizations use?

If not an S/D model, which of the following would you like to pretend are true?

1) Resources are not limiting (-> there is no economy)
2) The distribution of resources/goods matches the desire for resources/goods (-> there is no economy)

Assuming the converse of those are true, an S/D economy naturally follows, especially at the level of trade between governments.  (Within governments the government can introduce additional inefficiency by legislating against an S/D economy, but that leads to shortages or surpluses.  If the price of a good is too high, less of it gets bought.  If the price is too low, not everyone who wants at that price can have, and actual distribution post-transactions is often based on arbitrary things like political favor.  Basically, the real price is still the S/D price, but the government forces sale at a different price, and inefficiency occurs.  But regardless, that's an internal economy which requires top-down regulation.  An argument for options on *local* economy could be made from that, but it wouldn't effect any inter-governmental trade.)

I suppose you could also assume that dwarves do not act to acquire things they desire, but that also leads to no economy (and is a bizarre assumption since its basically violating the definition of 'desire').  It would also require the player to purchase random things from caravans (or not at all), because otherwise he is acquiring things he desires - and that sounds unfun.

S/D price-setting is an emergent behavior of individuals engaged in trading goods and services.  It requires no theorizing to cause it to occur, and specific government intervention to prevent it (not to mention crazy enforcement regimes - even the over-policed Soviet Union couldn't eliminate black markets). 

I don't know what it being a fantasy world has to do with it, honestly.  I can't see any fantasy assumptions that change that - in fact, the impetus to *do stuff*, usually a feature of the fantasy genre, generally depends upon individuals having unfulfilled desires.

[praguepride]

I support user profit's opinions, because let's be honest, he is the bottom line

[stoned funeral]

Squirrell is right, S/D is a matter of fact when it comes to sentient and sane beings who look out for their own interests. It can get more or less complicated, but it holds true. I don't know where you're going with the super genius theorists thing, because a non S/D economy just doesn't make any sense (such a thing wouldn't be called an economy). You've confused yourself with the idea of an "emergent economy system". If Toady models the economy to follow the laws of S/D and a few other important ones, there will be an emergent economy every game you play. If you mine a shitload of gold and sell it all, you'll see it fall in price. Think of it like how Toady is setting up the properties of metals, weapons, body parts, etc, and letting the combat emerge from that; he isn't making the game come up with a whole new randomized combat system every time.

That said, I think we're all arguing a moot point here, as Toady has said he will improve the economy, and I'm sure he will do so in a suitably thorough and logically sound fashion. And then some.

[Granite26]

I still think people are conflating capitalism(all exchanges are by def. equal value and there is no such thing as trade under nonviolent distress) with supply and demand economics.

While I politically agree with Squirrelloid's inefficiencies, I'm willing to accept a (fantasy) world where government actions don't cause massive inefficiencies, or where other forms of economic layouts are possible.  Supergeniuses coming up with new economic theories is, at best, like having Einstein theorizing in Newton's day:  Sure they may be true, things may be more complicated than we see, but the apple still falls.

It's the difference between saying "It's fantasy, dragons can fly" and "It's fantasy, anything can fly if it really wants to"

Profit: DeBeers(sp, I know) is evil, and they own the mines : If they dumped their load, they'd be broke tomorrow.(and the market would be saturated)  All sorts of immoral, especially considering it's the africans that are starving... On the neo-con side, sending the warlords food and medicine to bribe followers isn't helping either (and that's what any aid that isn't distributed by marines is, IMHO)

But it would have some pretty far-reaching ramifications. As it stands right now, I can strike the earth just about anywhere and see gems and ores exposed in the hillsides waiting to be mined.

I've always liked (and I think it's been suggested) the idea that an NPC mine's production of metal is tied to the amount of metal on the map (say 1 per year per vein, 2 per circle, and 1/10 per single tile) without destroying the material.  (This enables you to build forts and make them self sustaining exporters).

You are 100% right though.  There's a big disconnect between the value of things in the real world, and what the average fort drags out of the ground.  (in economic terms, the added value of the dwarves isn't really worth what gets paid for the raw materials.

Personally, I'm a fan of fewer 'perfect' sites.

[Tigershark13]

*sighs* don't bother trying to force capitalism upon an ancient people. Please. Also your understanding of communism is pathetically limited. Soviet Russia was totalitarianism as well as communist, all communist means is Government control over all businesses so everyone is in the employ of the government, slowly bringing everyone to equal level due to the fact wages can be set universally as opposed to differing for different companies, and in theory be set more fairly. By that standard USSR was not communist. The wages were by no means 'fairly' spread, therefore it was nothing but a totalitarian state pretending to be communist for control reasons.

anyway, Yes supply and demand plays a role but the 'world' economy wasn't so big, things from far away were worth more, didn't mean the merchant would KNOW that there was a demand, he wouldn't have had any contact with the fort since the last time he came (so the only demand he'd have is for orders from people the previous visit) so he'd have to bring a wide variety of goods, in the end it was all down to bartering. the 'World economy' as you described it was nothing like today, they didn't have the communication for it to be.

I only skim read this but still.

[praguepride]

Meh, i'm of the firm belief that if you take a small slice of the economic pie and just observe it, for the most part it's random fun!

Therefore, having random prices and objects makes sense! Maybe the elves stop bringing anything but cloth and berries because they're stopping in at a newly developed city with much more *ahem* inviting guests and so all the good stuff is gone by the time they get there.

The current economy makes sense from a "small view of a larger model." Why bother modeling the larger model and creating a working economy when there is no need to. Just like the current  fluid dynamics system works even though it really just cheats. Who cares? It's still Fun! Making caravans establish trade routes and have their wares be influenced by what places they visit would be a neat improvement. So if an elven caravan hits nothing but human lands, it might have more humie stuff then elfie stuff, but we don't need to reinvent the wheel here. DF doesn't need to be the first game to accurately model an economic system.

It's the same with the current political system. There isn't one, really! It's kind of a monarchy, except the king doesn't do anything except occasionally outlaw random things, or demand something gets made. Having a whole "dwarven constitution" starts turning the game from "Fun!" to "Work!" and that's to be avoided at all costs. So if you're an economic nut, why don't you try and justify what you see in the game with your economic knowledge instead of saying it needs to change to fit your view of the model.

Somethings do need to change, like maybe dwarves aren't as gung-ho! about looting eachother's X(pig tail pants)X but honestly, it's more fun with the randomness. Just like the names, descriptions, engravings. If you could pick them out, if you could "predict them" then that takes away a lot of the quirky charm of the game! I love my silk statues and dwarf-skin anvils (not magma safe ) and the elven caravans carrying nothing but cloth and berries year after year after year! If we developed a real economic model, I might not get my breeding pair of giant eagles during the first year, and that would definitly not be fun

[Squirrelloid]

I still think people are conflating capitalism(all exchanges are by def. equal value and there is no such thing as trade under nonviolent distress) with supply and demand economics.

True.  My proposal has absolutely nothing to do with capitalism.  Capitalism is political buzzword for a style of government-economic relationship.  I'll note that your parenthetical isn't actually the definition of capitalism (which requires some mention of *capital*).  Capitalism most certainly isn't the case in dwarf fortress, as it requires private ownership of the means of production (!true) and capital (wealth).  This has nothing to do with how the market actually operates.

While I politically agree with Squirrelloid's inefficiencies, I'm willing to accept a (fantasy) world where government actions don't cause massive inefficiencies, or where other forms of economic layouts are possible.  Supergeniuses coming up with new economic theories is, at best, like having Einstein theorizing in Newton's day:  Sure they may be true, things may be more complicated than we see, but the apple still falls.

There's nothing political about my calling them inefficiencies.  With government intervention things get sold at the wrong price.  That's inefficiency by definition, no matter what you believe about whether the government should interfere or not.  Regardless, at the level of intergovernmental exchange there's no power regulating the nature of those exchanges.  And the fortress relationship to merchants is effectively that - your dwarves can't impose your laws on the caravan because they just won't trade, or should leave and not come back.

*sighs* don't bother trying to force capitalism upon an ancient people. Please.

I have nowhere advocated we institute capitalism in DF.  For someone accusing me of a 'pathetic' understanding of communism, you don't even seem to know what capitalism is. 

See here.  I might specifically point out: "In the modern capitalist state, legislative action is confined to defining and enforcing the basic rules of the market,..." and "...allowing the free play of supply and demand."  That is, S/D is the 'basic rules of the market', which modern Capitalism tends to defer to, but is not part of Capitalism per se.  A Capitalism which regulated a vastly different framework than S/D is imaginable (although with inefficiency like all attempts to alter the market's natural behavior), as are economic systems which are not capitalism wanting to enforce normal market behavior.

Also your understanding of communism is pathetically limited. Soviet Russia was totalitarianism as well as communist, all communist means is Government control over all businesses so everyone is in the employ of the government, slowly bringing everyone to equal level due to the fact wages can be set universally as opposed to differing for different companies, and in theory be set more fairly. By that standard USSR was not communist. The wages were by no means 'fairly' spread, therefore it was nothing but a totalitarian state pretending to be communist for control reasons.

Quoth Wikipedia: "In modern usage, communism is often used to refer to Bolshevism or Marxism-Leninism."  If I meant to refer to the more idealized concept that has never been achieved in practice, I would use the term Communitarianism, which is the preferred term in modern circles (because it doesn't carry the baggage associating communism with the USSR, China, et al.).

anyway, Yes supply and demand plays a role but the 'world' economy wasn't so big, things from far away were worth more, didn't mean the merchant would KNOW that there was a demand, he wouldn't have had any contact with the fort since the last time he came (so the only demand he'd have is for orders from people the previous visit) so he'd have to bring a wide variety of goods, in the end it was all down to bartering. the 'World economy' as you described it was nothing like today, they didn't have the communication for it to be.

Where did we move from 'the price the merchant is willing to sell goods at' to 'the goods the merchant brings with him'?  My proposal is entirely about the *price* of goods.  The merchant should arrive with an idea about the market outside the fortress, which is certainly going to influence his trading with the fortress (if he knows he can get 5x as much elsewhere, he's not going to sell it to you.  Similarly, he should make reasonable offers based on some expectation of return for goods he takes off your hands).

Also, price carries knowledge about demand.  If the merchant finds it harder to buy a particular good at last years price, he'll know that demand has gone up or supply has gone down.  This is why markets are efficient - they provide a way for information about the desires of the population to be known to those who produce (and distribute) goods so that producers can produce an appropriate supply and distributors can bring an appropriate number with them.  Sometimes there are mismatches, but its far more efficient than any other method.

How do you know he's had no contact.  Maybe he ran into another caravan who had been to your fortress more recently?  Being at your fortress is not the only way to get information about your fortress.

Meh, i'm of the firm belief that if you take a small slice of the economic pie and just observe it, for the most part it's random fun!

Therefore, having random prices and objects makes sense!

Maybe in the fortresses early year(s).  But by the time you become a major industrial power (which with the rate a stonecrafter can spit out crafts, may even describe the first year in some industries) you shouldn't just be a price taker.

Also, they aren't random prices, they're fixed absolute prices.  Which makes every game feel very much the same, no matter how different the world is.  = Less Fun in my book.

[Tigershark13]

*shrugs* economic views = opinion I suppose, And I believe the general view of 'communism' is a poor one, and nothing like the actual Marxist view. Hense the fact soviet Russia = poor example.

anyway is the price not already decided by our current 'request' feature?

and honestly, what are the odds the merchants will tell the truth? sure there could be a chance of getting correct information but its far more likely to be outdated (maybe as your fort hits mountain home status or something very important that will change, but what merchants going to try keep tabs on some hole in the ground?)

[Squirrelloid]

*shrugs* economic views = opinion I suppose, And I believe the general view of 'communism' is a poor one, and nothing like the actual Marxist view. Hense the fact soviet Russia = poor example.

In common useage, communism does refer to a state like the Soviet Union.  This is fact, not opinion, and having a term for a such a state is useful (because its actually happened - no, Socialism does not apply as it is usually used in a different sense).  Similarly, S/D is quite distinct from Capitalism, also a fact.

anyway is the price not already decided by our current 'request' feature?

The problem is that there is an absolute value assigned to every good, so that goods like Native Platinum Goblets are vastly over-valued, especially when you try to dump 500 of them every year.  The request feature merely multiplies the absolute value by a surcharge because you got to request it specifically.

and honestly, what are the odds the merchants will tell the truth? sure there could be a chance of getting correct information but its far more likely to be outdated (maybe as your fort hits mountain home status or something very important that will change, but what merchants going to try keep tabs on some hole in the ground?)

In the real world this skill would have been known as haggling.  In DF its split between Negotiator and Judge of Intent.  You both start out with offers that differ from the real price, with each trying to take advantage of the other.  Either you come to a reasonable agreement (at or about S=D price) or one or the other party refuses to make a sufficiently good offer and no trade occurs, ie, is unwilling to pay the market price for the good.  (Or you aren't very good at haggling and get cheated - but Dwarves already have a skill to handle that part for you).  An understanding of S/D is still effecting the lowest price the merchant will accept, and the individual's demand is still determining just how much he's willing to pay.

[praguepride]

Maybe in the fortresses early year(s).  But by the time you become a major industrial power (which with the rate a stonecrafter can spit out crafts, may even describe the first year in some industries) you shouldn't just be a price taker.

Also, they aren't random prices, they're fixed absolute prices.  Which makes every game feel very much the same, no matter how different the world is.  = Less Fun in my book.

Ah, but you make the fatal "I AM SPECAIL!" flaw.

If you think about how much wealth your fortress produces, and then think "wait...what if ALL dwarf fortresses are about this productive" then it goes right back to what I'm saying. You're small potatoes, even with a capped out 200 dwarf Mountainholm. Given that there are usually at least 2 dwarf civs, 2 elves, a couple humies and maybe a friend gobbo or two, at most you're producing 1/10th  the world's industry. Chances are there's an NPC town that's doing it better because it's been around 10x as long as your dwarven fortress.

Also, prices aren't fixed. You know all those liason meetings, the screen where they say "hey! This is what we want! This is what we'll pay nearly 2x price for." That part comes true. I don't know about you, but I tailor my crafts based around those screens. I see "oh look, the humans want more mugs, better put a halt on toy boats and start cranking out mugs/flasks/cups etc."  I don't have to, I can still sell my other crafts for a tidy profit, but I like to pretend that I'm doing my part to participate in the economy.

An easy way to improve this is to also make merchants not buy everything under the sun, but that's another topic. I'd say it'd be easy that while setting the prices higher, you can set prices lower as well. So the merchants might say "I don't want cloth, I'm only paying 1/2 cloth prices and if  you show up with cloth, well then tough luck, take your 1/2 price and go.

[Squirrelloid]

Maybe in the fortresses early year(s).  But by the time you become a major industrial power (which with the rate a stonecrafter can spit out crafts, may even describe the first year in some industries) you shouldn't just be a price taker.

Also, they aren't random prices, they're fixed absolute prices.  Which makes every game feel very much the same, no matter how different the world is.  = Less Fun in my book.

Ah, but you make the fatal "I AM SPECAIL!" flaw.

If you think about how much wealth your fortress produces, and then think "wait...what if ALL dwarf fortresses are about this productive" then it goes right back to what I'm saying. You're small potatoes, even with a capped out 200 dwarf Mountainholm. Given that there are usually at least 2 dwarf civs, 2 elves, a couple humies and maybe a friend gobbo or two, at most you're producing 1/10th  the world's industry. Chances are there's an NPC town that's doing it better because it's been around 10x as long as your dwarven fortress.

Also, prices aren't fixed. You know all those liason meetings, the screen where they say "hey! This is what we want! This is what we'll pay nearly 2x price for." That part comes true. I don't know about you, but I tailor my crafts based around those screens. I see "oh look, the humans want more mugs, better put a halt on toy boats and start cranking out mugs/flasks/cups etc."  I don't have to, I can still sell my other crafts for a tidy profit, but I like to pretend that I'm doing my part to participate in the economy.

An easy way to improve this is to also make merchants not buy everything under the sun, but that's another topic. I'd say it'd be easy that while setting the prices higher, you can set prices lower as well. So the merchants might say "I don't want cloth, I'm only paying 1/2 cloth prices and if  you show up with cloth, well then tough luck, take your 1/2 price and go.

First, those price increases are 'service charges' for bothering to adhere to what they wanted.  Of course, half the time I get crap like 'we want glass windows' (wait, no sand?) or 'we want cooked meals' (geez i'm going to feel cheesy if i actually sell masterwork dwarven syrup roasts).  And they're completely inconsistent too - they ask for totally arbitrary things every year, so there's no feeling of a persistent world outside your fortress.  And their entire purpose is to vaguely mimic a S/D anyway.

Second, I have had fortresses where, for particular industries, i probably had 50% of the world's production capacity.  Consider a fortress with 10 legendary armorsmiths (done it) - that's a substantial portion of the world's armor production capacity.  You could outfit a few thousand soldiers in full platemail in a year period, which probably exceeds the world's demand for armor in many worlds.  Its not just total population vs. your fortress's population, you also have to consider labor distribution.  Most fortresses don't do everything.  And there are some jobs you can't even do (milk cows?), so that means you aren't wasting some parts of your workforce on tasks that obviously other settlements are (since you can buy cow's milk).  This isn't assuming the player's fortress is special, this is assuming that the player can choose to focus his labor effort (which he can), and that doing so should lead to a dynamical response.

Furthermore, you're ignoring that I want a S/D model to determine what prices are *in the absence of the player's fortress* to start with, so that every world has a different economy based on the actual distribution of resources and settlements.  A world where iron is worth 10 dwarfbucks/bar is going to provide quite different trading incentives than a world where its 100 dwarfbucks/bar.

I would certainly welcome the addition of negative preferences.  But that's just another ad hoc attempt to simulate vaguely S/D dynamics.  Why have an imitation of a cake when you could actually eat cake?

[praguepride]

Meh, it's random enough with supply being completely random. I've had maps where the dwarves didn't have access to iron at all! Had to trade solely with the humies and it was interesting because they didn't make things easy for me. Instead of bringing iron bars they brought everything made of iron that I had to smelt down and re-do. But you know what? It was Fun!

Also, check out your population figures before you accept a new map. From what I remember populations are well into the 10s of thousands (more so if you do a large map) 200 dwarves, even legendary ones, are still small potatoes

[Granite26]

Also, check out your population figures before you accept a new map. From what I remember populations are well into the 10s of thousands (more so if you do a large map) 200 dwarves, even legendary ones, are still small potatoes

You do make a good point.  Hell, you may even be right... But shouldn't that mean that your crafts should be worth even less?  (This gets back into the 'haulers shouldn't be 90% of the total cost of making things)

[Squirrelloid]

You may note I was talking about productive output.  Lets assume for the sake of argument that 10 legendary armorsmiths can produce 3000 full suits of platemail in a year.  The population cap for a large world is, what? 20,000?  How many of those do you think are plausibly employed in the military?  How many of those in the military need a new suit of armor in a given year?  My money is on 3000 being greater than that number.  Ie, your 10 legendary armorsmiths produce more armor than the *world* needs.  It doesn't matter that they are 1/2000th of the world's population, they are more than sufficient.

I would be willing to bet that the number of legendary weaponsmiths required to make 20,000 weapons (enough to give one to every man, woman, and child) each year is in the ballpark of 8 working fulltime.

At which point, that you have 200/20,000 people *isn't relevant* to your economic footprint.  Its the import and export of goods that is relevant.

(If you really care about it, at 200 dwarves you have 1% of the world population, which is more than any city in the world today can claim.  That doesn't stop imports and exports to New York City being immensely important to the global economy).