king's tax in endless game

[dota matthäus]

what exactly does the king's tax do? i remember it from the demo and iirc it didn't have a real purpose back then.
i know it says in the patch notes "It's counted per population and therefore should become a counterbalance for players who hoard huge wealth despite having non-optimized economies."

but neither is my economy optimized, nor do i have basically any wealth, on the contrary i'm struggling with food every winter and can't export goods that would bring good money because the trade routes are unbelievably expensive. i just read in the patch notes:

"[Experimental] "Trade logistics" development branch now lowers the cost of new trade routes by 50% instead of clamping it at 25.
[Experimental] Cost of opening new trade routes now scales exponentially with every opened trade route.
[Experimental] Base cost of opening a trade route was increased from 12 to 20 (that is before the good value multiplier)."

this is insane, i mean the trade routes were super expensive before (without the development) and it looks like they get even more expensive now?

i only play endless mode with duplicate starting supplies, no enemies and no weather effects. i just want to chill and build my town without having to deal with difficulties. in this mode i'm also unable to claim new territories, which is fine. but i don't see what role this tax plays. also, it seems that compared to my earnings, the tax is unreasonably high.

[madpraxis]

They weren't that expensive before, nor are they now.
I think, what, without the point invested to make them cheaper, like 25 regional wealth or something like that, right.
That is literally a handful of planks exported. Or anything else. Or just a few months tax on a couple double tier 2 homes.

Yea, the more fancy goods cost more, but again, regional wealth isn't that hard to accrue. It just takes a bit more planning ahead is all now, and not exporting literally everything under the sun right off the bat.

I'll add an edit here: Most things don't even *need* a trade route. Just 'major' trades, which is everything that isn't a 'basic' good. Just gets you a trader coming in is all, so you can trade more quicker. You don't NEED a trade route opened for minor goods to trade them.

[dota matthäus]

Originally posted by madpraxis:

They weren't that expensive before, nor are they now.
I think, what, without the point invested to make them cheaper, like 25 regional wealth or something like that, right.
That is literally a handful of planks exported. Or anything else. Or just a few months tax on a couple double tier 2 homes.

check out this thread:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1363080/discussions/0/4362376656105348741/

5-figure cost for trade routes. that's not expensive, that's completely off the hook lol

Originally posted by madpraxis:

I'll add an edit here: Most things don't even *need* a trade route. Just 'major' trades, which is everything that isn't a 'basic' good. Just gets you a trader coming in is all, so you can trade more quicker. You don't NEED a trade route opened for minor goods to trade them.

so am i understanding you correctly that in general, trade routes only really pay off for major goods and don't have a significant impact on minor goods?

[madpraxis]

Only major routes need them to function.
Everything else works just fine. You lose out on large quantity buys, but to keep things ticking along with the minor routes? Nope.
If you plan on making all your dosh from exporting 742 planks a year, yea, it would surely help. It *does* take time for things to move in/out without a trade route, since its literally your dude and a pack. Or pack horse. Not some guy showing up with a cart full of junk.

Note, you aren't going to be bringing in loads of cash all at once without a trade route. Lessee, without trade routes for them, the game I was just testing things in beta with...floating around 30 planks, 80 firewood, 10-20 stones, 50 or so each veggies and meat, 20 hides, was making 200-300 regional a month off those exports. On top of importing ale up to 20. Oop, did unlock leather. Exporting like 10 a month or so.

Thinking that is the logic behind the new trade route cost, you can't HAVE everything all at once, and too slow down the massive influx of regional income. Though, yeesh, it can be turned down some, hah. Stepping up instead of exponential would be the key. Though, that is why its beta branch for testing.

[Jabberwocky]

If you get your approval above 80%, you can then build a manor and start taxing your people. A 10 percent tax should be plenty to meet the king's demands. Maybe even 5 % would be enough. I only play military campaigns, so I always need a little more in the treasury.

[dota matthäus]

Originally posted by madpraxis:

Only major routes need them to function.
Everything else works just fine. You lose out on large quantity buys, but to keep things ticking along with the minor routes? Nope.
If you plan on making all your dosh from exporting 742 planks a year, yea, it would surely help. It *does* take time for things to move in/out without a trade route, since its literally your dude and a pack. Or pack horse. Not some guy showing up with a cart full of junk.

Note, you aren't going to be bringing in loads of cash all at once without a trade route. Lessee, without trade routes for them, the game I was just testing things in beta with...floating around 30 planks, 80 firewood, 10-20 stones, 50 or so each veggies and meat, 20 hides, was making 200-300 regional a month off those exports. On top of importing ale up to 20. Oop, did unlock leather. Exporting like 10 a month or so.

Thinking that is the logic behind the new trade route cost, you can't HAVE everything all at once, and too slow down the massive influx of regional income. Though, yeesh, it can be turned down some, hah. Stepping up instead of exponential would be the key. Though, that is why its beta branch for testing.

interesting. thanks for those insights, i see you dig quite into the game's guts :)

[dota matthäus]

Originally posted by Jabberwocky:

If you get your approval above 80%, you can then build a manor and start taxing your people. A 10 percent tax should be plenty to meet the king's demands. Maybe even 5 % would be enough. I only play military campaigns, so I always need a little more in the treasury.

oh i saw while creating a new game that you can turn the tax off in endless mode, so that's solved :)

[Franzosisch]

It steals all your money unless you know exactly what to build and when to build it.

[Murph]

Originally posted by madpraxis:

They weren't that expensive before, nor are they now.
I think, what, without the point invested to make them cheaper, like 25 regional wealth or something like that, right.
That is literally a handful of planks exported. Or anything else. Or just a few months tax on a couple double tier 2 homes.

Yea, the more fancy goods cost more, but again, regional wealth isn't that hard to accrue. It just takes a bit more planning ahead is all now, and not exporting literally everything under the sun right off the bat.

I'll add an edit here: Most things don't even *need* a trade route. Just 'major' trades, which is everything that isn't a 'basic' good. Just gets you a trader coming in is all, so you can trade more quicker. You don't NEED a trade route opened for minor goods to trade them.

Huh? Let's say you want to trade with your neighbor, 16,000 sound right? how about 33,000. It's not tenable and is totally out of whack right now, even if you 'specc'd ' in trading. This 'you don't really need to trade those items' isn't a fix. what would you say if they change it so you NEED to trade those items, would you care then? Have that perspective. The kings tax is a downward spiral and untenable. The trading is a joke and I recommend others to buy every route before patching your game.

The patch addressed some issues but has made the gameplay buggy, bogged down, and worse just so trading exploiters are curtailed. For those of us who play the game as intended, its a bummer, workers are stuck and wont work, I can go on and on.... a total bummer.

[madpraxis]

I do have that perspective. I've said before that its been tuned WAAY beyond sanity. Having said that, its a BETA TEST BRANCH. The simple solution is to just not test unreleased patches, and play the 'stable' game.
It *IS* ridiculous, as it stands. It should step up, not exponential up. I can see why he made that choice, since it is stupid easy to swim in regional income from trade, but...yeesh. Too much uptuning. As it stands, you should be focusing on a few of the 'major' items to produce/sell, while using pack mules to move things around between villages. That *seems* to be the goal here, to curtail the ridiculous regional income, while giving players an actual reason to expand into other regions.

But, again, sliding up that exponential scale is...horrible.

[Jabberwocky]

Originally posted by Franzosisch:

It steals all your money unless you know exactly what to build and when to build it.

Not in my experience. I wasn't following any build order and was messing around on the beta branch for quite a while before king's tax became an issue. I didn't have a manor yet, because I hadn't yet formed my six different groups of militia. So I sent my 20 spearmen out to hunt for bandit camps and built a blacksmith, a fletcher and a joiner to make bows, shields and weapons. I paid the first two king's taxes with plunder from bandit camps, then I had formed my six groups of militia. They were only a few men strong each, yet, but that didn't matter, they counted as six banners and would fill up over time once I got more recruits and equipment.

So I could finally build my manor. After that was built, a 10 % tax already was much more than I ever needed to pay the king's tax. I reckon that even 5 % should do it comfortably, if you do not need to build up a strong treasury. I wanted to, because I wanted to upgrade my retinue to check out the new sets or armor they have in the beta patch version.

[Franzosisch]

Originally posted by Jabberwocky:

Originally posted by Franzosisch:

It steals all your money unless you know exactly what to build and when to build it.

Not in my experience. I wasn't following any build order and was messing around on the beta branch for quite a while before king's tax became an issue. I didn't have a manor yet, because I hadn't yet formed my six different groups of militia. So I sent my 20 spearmen out to hunt for bandit camps and built a blacksmith, a fletcher and a joiner to make bows, shields and weapons. I paid the first two king's taxes with plunder from bandit camps, then I had formed my six groups of militia. They were only a few men strong each, yet, but that didn't matter, they counted as six banners and would fill up over time once I got more recruits and equipment.

So I could finally build my manor. After that was built, a 10 % tax already was much more than I ever needed to pay the king's tax. I reckon that even 5 % should do it comfortably, if you do not need to build up a strong treasury. I wanted to, because I wanted to upgrade my retinue to check out the new sets or armor they have in the beta patch version.

So you meta'd the game without realizing it.

[RonEmpire]

Don't forget the "oversupply" mechanics. LOL