Linking prosperity with food production creates an inescapable downward spiral for fiefs

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

With my towns being safe as hell (as I'm actively partolling them and selling items only there) my prosperity sky-rocketed. It's just impossible to keep up with food production or decrease prosperity. There is no option other than war but that breaks the whole concept of having a town.

So what are my results after 100h+ play time with this save?

• ~5 towns
• All have food up to 160 but it drops zu zero every now and then for no clear reason
• Garrison is 0 - all my worthy soldiers died because of starvation
• Constant war against all factions - they know about the missing garrisons and want to make a quick win
• Donating food gives a small boost but can't solve any problem in long term
• Since there is constant war, all armies suffer, everybody has crappy soldiers and towns are often completely without food
• Since there is so much weakness in the system, bandits feel free to do whatever they want and steal additional food from villages
• Bannerlord transformed to "get thousands of grain, donate it and watch your garrisons die"-simulator. I gave up on this, my towns stay without garrison and I keep my bst soldiers in my own, massive army (336 max atm...still increasing with clan tier, perks and policies). Tier <4 gets dumped into the towns for hunger death

If you ask me that's another broken mechanic regarding food.

How do you donate food? Or do you mean just sell it to market?

 

[Tintenkobold]

I just sell it in large amounts. You can see a small effect on food stocks and it also helps your vassals to not starve. I'm not sure if this is really a thing, I will further investigate this.

I'm also planning to do another test: Sell food to villages even if they can't pay. Maybe they sell it directly to food stocks. Not many hopes that this works though.

 

[Waybook]

Personally, I'm ok with cities allowing a bigger garrison than castles, but the limit should be the max garrison number itself, not food supply. Especially when a city can only store a few days worth of food.

 

[Parkerg12]

I believe prosperity should decrease when the food is decreasing. Right now the death waves happen because:
1. Prosperity continues to increase even while food amount in storage decreases, making it decrease even faster. So even if you will just increase food storage amount - it will not help right away. Prosperity should be increased only with positive food balance. Or maybe even food shortage should be added to calculation like now, but not the food shortage below 0 (when starving), but food shortage even when town still has something in storage.
2. Food storage is small and lasts a couple of days. It does not bring much stability. I guess it should be around 10 times larger.
3. Prices are jumping faster when difference between current and stable price is higher (maybe that change follows some exponential equation too, see the topic about price formulation), so if some trader brings huge amounts of food - price drops faster than it will rise back after the food is eaten.
4. Food is eaten at much faster pace when it is available in larger amounts (overconsumption). And it even brings 10 times less prosperity.
With 1 and 2 it should already shift the food-prosperity waves equilibrium towards full granary, without garrison dying.


More than just -1 food = -1 prosperity. It works like that for food shortage. For food surplus +10 food converts to +1 prosperity. So there is an overconsumption of one order of magnitude.
And citizens eat all the food much faster to start starving again.
And when they do start starving, as you said, it takes time to bring back the demand, to decrease prosperity again.


You can see how prices do work now here:
Supply and Demand self-balancing economy and how it does work now
There are big price shifts when stocks are huge, but close to linear (and much smaller) when stocks are 0.


I do not have a knowledge of code, but I did some tests to find out how things work.
Prices are based on prosperity and stock amount. Generally.
And food consumed is increased when the stock is higher, so it depends not solely on prosperity. There is some cap for food consumption though.

Nice analysis btw, I think you are seeing the same kinda thing I'm seeing. the mechanics are working, not perfectly but they are working. I am actually really excited to see how it balances out because I don't think they need major changes for it and cities will be able to cycle without cutting to deep into their stockpile. Once that happens all sorts of different mechanics can be implemented.

 

[Nokturnel]

For those interested in a fix and don't feel like waiting on TW.

V's Garrisons Don't Eat Nor Starve - v2

Your precious garrisons will no longer starve when a passing army buys up all food in town. Donating to AI garrisons is finally worth doing. May also help against AI snowballing.

www.nexusmods.com

It's a band-aid fix, but it stops the Garrison Bleeding that's for sure. Pretty balanced because no one's garrison starves.Only the militia does, so yay less fighting only Militia troops during sieges.

 

[heu3becteh]

Nice analysis btw, I think you are seeing the same kinda thing I'm seeing. the mechanics are working, not perfectly but they are working. I am actually really excited to see how it balances out because I don't think they need major changes for it and cities will be able to cycle without cutting to deep into their stockpile. Once that happens all sorts of different mechanics can be implemented.

Thank you~
I really think some tuning is needed, there is no need to cut off features from the game (like some people are suggesting), these mechanics could work interesting way if fixed.

It's a band-aid fix, but it stops the Garrison Bleeding that's for sure. Pretty balanced because no one's garrison starves.

And for now some fix like that could help with the most problematic for everyone thing in that issue. If garrison would be fine, no one will be able to care less about prosperity waves (:

 

[Tintenkobold]

So today all my cities dropped to 0 food stocks. Market is full, villages do well, no war, massive campaign against bandits with my fast moving king elite troop. Policies are optimizied and all towns are set to irrigation and have all perks fully developed. I guess this is broken then, can't imagine that someone can do more to solve this. I also have the feeling that bandit camps are just cheated in like lords are cheated in. I killed them for hours now. Every camp and every moving troop got killed. As soon as I move away it respawns. WTF?

As my tier 5 and 6 elite troops start to starve, I won't play anymore until Taleworlds does something against it. It's not worth my time and it's really frustrating. I'm not convinced that mods solve the problem for me. I want to see improvements in the native game and play it again so I can confirm it's fixed.

And btw - why did they stop to do daily beta branch releases as promised? Please kick Taleworlds management, I think the problem can be found there. It's not the developers or community management. If someone has the chance to bypass community feedback directly to Yavuz please do so.

 

[Deathwish16]

So today all my cities dropped to 0 food stocks. Market is full, villages do well, no war, massive campaign against bandits with my fast moving king elite troop. Policies are optimizied and all towns are set to irrigation and have all perks fully developed. I guess this is broken then, can't imagine that someone can do more to solve this. I also have the feeling that bandit camps are just cheated in like lords are cheated in. I killed them for hours now. Every camp and every moving troop got killed. As soon as I move away it respawns. WTF?

As my tier 5 and 6 elite troops start to starve, I won't play anymore until Taleworlds does something against it. It's not worth my time and it's really frustrating. I'm not convinced that mods solve the problem for me. I want to see improvements in the native game and play it again so I can confirm it's fixed.

And btw - why did they stop to do daily beta branch releases as promised? Please kick Taleworlds management, I think the problem can be found there. It's not the developers or community management. If someone has the chance to bypass community feedback directly to Yavuz please do so.

If you can post a screenshot of the food tool tip and the market it can help diagnose the problem.

 

[mexxico]

I will make some study on these issues. You can send me your save files with your starving fortifications even their villages are healthy and garrison is low. I will examine them.

As you know main inputs of food are :
-lands around town / castle (10/5, if there is no siege)
-villages (4/8/12 according to their heart level, if not raided)
-food bought from market (prosperity x (demand of item) denars are spend each day on each item)

Main outputs are :
-garrison (each 20 eat 1 food daily)
-prospeirty (each 50 eat 1 food daily)

At late game bandits are scale up to 3x while villagers are still same. This can be one problem. Ratio of resources carried to settlements successfully can reduce by time. I will also check number of infested hideouts at late game and lower them if needed. Also at game start prosperity values are not so natural, some settlements have high prosperirty even they are far to food resources in long gameplays this can create problems at these settlements.

In all added up there can be a problem in this issue especially at late game and I will try to make it better. You can send me your save files and inform me which settlements having problem.

 

[Pejot]

I will make some study on these issues. You can send me your save files with your starving fortifications even their villages are healthy and garrison is low. I will examine them.

As you know main inputs of food are :
-lands around town / castle (10/5, if there is no siege)
-villages (4/8/12 according to their heart level, if not raided)
-food bought from market (prosperity x (demand of item) denars are spend each day on each item)

Main outputs are :
-garrison (each 20 eat 1 food daily)
-prospeirty (each 50 eat 1 food daily)

At late game bandits are scale up to 3x while villagers are still same. This can be one problem. Ratio of resources carried to settlements successfully can reduce by time. I will also check number of infested hideouts at late game and lower them if needed. Also at game start prosperity values are not so natural, some settlements have high prosperirty even they are far to food resources in long gameplays this can create problems at these settlements.

Anyway there can be a problem in this issue especially at late game and I will try to make it better. You can send me your save files.

Maybe if You change the ratio of prosperity drop from -1 food = -1 prosperity to -1 food = -10 prosperity. This way the town/castle will balance itself in 5 days if no caravan will arrive or other food source will make it rise.
Another thing, correct me if I'm wrong but in garrison 20 units eat 1 food per day but in the army the ratio is lower (more units eat 1 food) what is the reason for that? Shouldn't units in party eat more than in garrison?

 

[mexxico]

Maybe if You change the ratio of prosperity drop from -1 food = -1 prosperity to -1 food = -10 prosperity. This way the town/castle will balance itself in 5 days if no caravan will arrive or other food source will make it rise.
Another thing, correct me if I'm wrong but in garrison 20 units eat 1 food per day but in the army the ratio is lower (more units eat 1 food) what is the reason for that? Shouldn't units in party eat more than in garrison?

No, both same every 20 troops eat 1 food at garrison or map even they are at map or settlement.

Increasing number of prosperity lost in each missing food is one solution (because prosperity is not more important than your garrisons) however I need to examine deeply late campaign and ratio of villagers destroyed by bandits on way to towns year by year to find out main reasons behind these problems, also there are another factors need to be examined. As I said above you can send me your save files if you think you did everything right however could not stop starving in your fortifications even you have acceptable number of garrisons.

These areas probably need some improvements and we will care of it.

 

[VanHoven]

snip

One issue that is vaguely related in my opinion is that bandits are not created equal. Especially steppe bandits feel like they are a much bigger threat to villagers then all the other bandit factions, partly due to their speed but also because even very small partys can kill villagers without a problem. I felt like keeping my khuzait towns and castles well fed was much more challenging than the rest. I don't know if it's possible to analyse lost villagers on way to towns per region, but it may be worth an investigation.

 

[Nokturnel]

Main outputs are :
-garrison (each 20 eat 1 food daily)
-prospeirty (each 50 eat 1 food daily)

Why is prosperity causing Food to get eaten in the first place? I understand Militia and Garrisons (Though I like the fix that makes it so Garrisons are fed with their wages) but having a rich city shouldn't be eating into the food supply.

It also has nothing to do with Bandits, I use the BuyPatrol mod to keep all bandits/looters/small armies away from my villages. It just seems prosperity will always rise to the point of eating more food than your villages can produce even fully upgraded. Aquaducts and Fairgrounds only make this problem worse as they increase prosperity.

Also, Sieges are currently causing all food to disappear whether there was any in storage or not, making storage useless. On top of the current amount of food you can have in storage is insanely low.

What I find odd though, is somehow the AI keeps their Towns fed better than the player can. Even though like in my game where I use BuyPatrols, their lands are infested with Bandits while mine are clean as a whistle. (As they can't buy Patrols, only the player can)

 

[Tacaxs]

I will make some study on these issues. You can send me your save files with your starving fortifications even their villages are healthy and garrison is low. I will examine them.

As you know main inputs of food are :
-lands around town / castle (10/5, if there is no siege)
-villages (4/8/12 according to their heart level, if not raided)
-food bought from market (prosperity x (demand of item) denars are spend each day on each item)

Main outputs are :
-garrison (each 20 eat 1 food daily)
-prospeirty (each 50 eat 1 food daily)

At late game bandits are scale up to 3x while villagers are still same. This can be one problem. Ratio of resources carried to settlements successfully can reduce by time. I will also check number of infested hideouts at late game and lower them if needed. Also at game start prosperity values are not so natural, some settlements have high prosperirty even they are far to food resources in long gameplays this can create problems at these settlements.

In all added up there can be a problem in this issue especially at late game and I will try to make it better. You can send me your save files and inform me which settlements having problem.

@mexxico wouldn't it help if lords could help with clearing hideouts as well? (or are they doing it already?) No extra effort so player can do it's job as well, but just sometimes in order to keep it at healthy level.

 

[daxiapi777]

Why is prosperity causing Food to get eaten in the first place? I understand Militia and Garrisons (Though I like the fix that makes it so Garrisons are fed with their wages) but having a rich city shouldn't be eating into the food supply.

It also has nothing to do with Bandits, I use the BuyPatrol mod to keep all bandits/looters/small armies away from my villages. It just seems prosperity will always rise to the point of eating more food than your villages can produce even fully upgraded. Aquaducts and Fairgrounds only make this problem worse as they increase prosperity.

Also, Sieges are currently causing all food to disappear whether there was any in storage or not, making storage useless. On top of the current amount of food you can have in storage is insanely low.

Indeed, those lands around town and village inputs are nothing compared to the food consumption induced by prosperity. Even if you eliminate all the bandits, your towns will still be starving because of the skyrocketing prosperity. And what's worse, when your town is starving, your prosperity will keep growing. You would think stuff like policies that gave prosperity are good bonus, but no, they are self-destruction weapons.

 

[heu3becteh]

It also has nothing to do with Bandits, I use the BuyPatrol mod to keep all bandits/looters/small armies away from my villages. It just seems prosperity will always rise to the point of eating more food than your villages can produce even fully upgraded.

I do not think problem is related to bandits as well.

Even if you will have perfect connection of villages and town, stable supply from caravans - inevitably at some point prosperity will rise until the point it can not be sustained. And it can not decrease without the garrison dying.
These waves of prosperity change should occur before town is starving.

I believe prosperity should decrease when the food is decreasing. Right now the death waves happen because:
1. Prosperity continues to increase even while food amount in storage decreases, making it decrease even faster. So even if you will just increase food storage amount - it will not help right away. Prosperity should be increased only with positive food balance. Or maybe even food shortage should be added to calculation like now, but not the food shortage below 0 (when starving), but food shortage even when town still has something in storage.
2. Food storage is small and lasts a couple of days. It does not bring much stability. I guess it should be around 10 times larger.
3. Prices are jumping faster when difference between current and stable price is higher (maybe that change follows some exponential equation too, see the topic about price formulation), so if some trader brings huge amounts of food - price drops faster than it will rise back after the food is eaten.
4. Food is eaten at much faster pace when it is available in larger amounts (overconsumption). And it even brings 10 times less prosperity.
With 1 and 2 it should already shift the food-prosperity waves equilibrium towards full granary, without garrison dying.

 

[mexxico]

@mexxico wouldn't it help if lords could help with clearing hideouts as well? (or are they doing it already?) No extra effort so player can do it's job as well, but just sometimes in order to keep it at healthy level.

Normally lords already do that. In some cases they clear hideouts (but not by entering hideout by entering a settlement which has clear hideout issue) However maybe they do that less than expected. Probably this problem is not just related to bandits / hideouts, they can be only side effects. I will examine situation and inform you what is happening.

 

[Pejot]

Why is prosperity causing Food to get eaten in the first place? I understand Militia and Garrisons (Though I like the fix that makes it so Garrisons are fed with their wages) but having a rich city shouldn't be eating into the food supply.

I think prosperity here stands in place of number of resident's so it's normal that it will lower the food. Based on what mexxico wrote it seams that 50 prosperity is equivalent of 20 residents (20 garrison troops eat 1 food). This means that a town with 5000 prosperity is equivalent of town with 2000 resident's that eat 100 food per day. With 3 maxed out villages You have 36 food daily so with no garrison you're able to provide food to town with prosperity of 1800 without taking market into account. Let's say that those villages produce grain and they can give 400 grain to the town per day so You have additional 43 (or something around it) food on the market. In this setting you're able to sustain a town with 3950 prosperity and no garrison. Any more than that will be achieved only through trade (caravans). That's quite low I think. There are many prosperity buffs and lot of towns mid-end game with 10000 prosperity. This means that they need 200 food daily. Villages in perfect setting provide less than half of that. Isn't it too low @mexxico ?
I think trade should be responsible for 20% food demand at max.
One more thing in mid-late game if an army of 1200+ stops in the city they buy out whole food available on the market. I found out this as one of the causes of starving in my city.

Edit:
I forgot about other closest villages that sell in town. But I wasn't too far away from the truth cause 400 grain is the amount usually seen in prosperous towns that are away from frontier. This means that not 3 connected villages provide it but all that comes to the town to sell.

 

[Waybook]

Let us assign companion parties to anti-bandit duty. (This would mean they'd stay away from the war frontlines.)

 

[mexxico]

There are many prosperity buffs and lot of towns mid-end game with 10000 prosperity. This means that they need 200 food daily. Villages in perfect setting provide less than half of that. Isn't it too low @mexxico ?

This is one of the problems. Prosperity starts with 5000 maximum at game start (some Western Empire towns), 3500 as average. It should not be 2x in 5-10 years. I will also examine factors increasing prosperity. It should increase slower. Some projects or policies can be unbalanced. Also consume of some items give additional prosperity. I was not fan of this design actually but it is wanted and there. Also you do not know which items these are yet. Player is not informed well about this design yet.

Let us assign companion parties to anti-bandit duty. (This would mean they'd stay away from the war frontlines.)

Yes, these things will be added by time. You should be able to assign your parties different duties.