Why am I losing so many people all of a sudden? (Solved)

[1SlimShaney]

For some reason I've gone from gaining about 100 people a week to losing almost 1000 people a week in the course of two months. I've heard of "the great die out" where all your citizens become old and drop dead all at once, but I think I've done pretty good to balance that out. Is there any other possible explanation? And how can I gain them back?

[King DaMuncha]

Im surprised the devs havent fixed this problem, its been in the game since release.

[MarkJohnson]

Originally posted by 1SlimShaney:

For some reason I've gone from gaining about 100 people a week to losing almost 1000 people a week in the course of two months. I've heard of "the great die out" where all your citizens become old and drop dead all at once, but I think I've done pretty good to balance that out. Is there any other possible explanation? And how can I gain them back?

This usually happens when you build too fast.

Also, cims moving in at the start are adults only. So you end up with a large amount of adults and they only live 4-6 years so they die off rather close together and you get a large death wave.

If you get abandonment from this, you may need to add more deathcare.

[kristofburger]

-1000 per week sounds like polluted water, actually. It can creep on you in certain maps even if you use water treatment plants.

[barrygreybeard]

Originally posted by King DaMuncha:

Im surprised the devs havent fixed this problem, its been in the game since release.

its not a problem its just the way the game works and is working as intended so nothing to fix. It's the life cycle of those residing in the city.

[King DaMuncha]

But they all have the same life span and they all die at the same time, I loose 100k population every hour, and then they come back, and then they all die, and then they all come back all at once.

[barrygreybeard]

there are guides you can read to explain how to populate your cities so you minimize that effect. In normal play that is never a problem, I loose maybe up to 15% population max.

Its when people use unlimited money and unlock everything at the start and/or build on more than the 9 tiles it can be a problem. they zone vast areas of residential causing huge influx so when they die the population plummets, its the game mechanics. Maybe it will be different in the next iteration of C:S but not this one.

[MarkJohnson]

Originally posted by King DaMuncha:

But they all have the same life span and they all die at the same time, I loose 100k population every hour, and then they come back, and then they all die, and then they all come back all at once.

They do not have the same life span nor do they all die at the same time.

It is a cycle of life and death. Since cims only live 5 year average (4-6 years) it just seems that way.

So this means 20% of your population dies every year. But they do seem to die is waves as you build in waves. i.e. you build massive residential for a while, then you ignore residential and then build jobs for a while. you have have big gaps of low growth and then spurts of high growth.

If you're losing 100k an hour (real-time I assume?), you must have a very large city. My current city is 300k (9-tiles)and I lose maybe 50k per cycle. My 655k (25-tiles) city cycles maybe 75k or so.

But watch you population overlay map when building. It shows you the birth and death rates. It shows you how the cycle is going and the unemployment rates.

[1SlimShaney]

This is a standard game, (no cheats) and I've tried to avoid building large amoubts of residential at once. I build residential according to demand. (Small demand = small area. Larger demand = larger area). This is the first time its happened to me, so it may just be the first wave of death.

Originally posted by -DI- rmjohnson144:

If you're losing 100k an hour

1k* per ingame week

[SkiRich]

Its either a death wave or polluted water.
The vanilla AI for lifespan assumes a fixed life for every citizen with zero variance. Hence you need to plan for "Birth Areas"
There was an AI mod called Early Death that randomized killing cims. Which is more real life, but has since been abandoned.
There was also a mod that randomized age and education for people moving in from outside but again abandoned. Too bad, these should have been in game.

The base game is really not a simulator, its just a platform to build stuff. It truely becomes a simulator when you can mimic real life scenarios.

One really good real life simulator mod is broken but in the works to be repaired, rush hour.
After dark dlc claimed behavioral AI changes when the city goes dark but I find that to be a false statement. Traffic, schools, work all still behave as if its 9AM in the middle of the night.

Vanilla is no simulator, so use the rules they lay out to your advantage. For example, if you zoned an area for residential but nothing is being built? Kill some Cims off by placing a water tower in the middle of a factory zone. Kill off a few thousand cims, and watch the demand for residential skyrocket. Remove the water tower before the city dies and now you have a new batch of CIMS rushing to occupy houses and new houses being built.

Manage your cims lives manually and you can prevent deathwaves. Morbid I know, but stupid AI needs stupid solutions.

[MarkJohnson]

Originally posted by 1SlimShaney:

This is a standard game, (no cheats) and I've tried to avoid building large amoubts of residential at once. I build residential according to demand. (Small demand = small area. Larger demand = larger area). This is the first time its happened to me, so it may just be the first wave of death.

Originally posted by -DI- rmjohnson144:

If you're losing 100k an hour

1k* per ingame week

How big is your city? i.e. what is your population and how many tiles are unlocked?

[1SlimShaney]

Originally posted by -DI- rmjohnson144:

How big is your city? i.e. what is your population and how many tiles are unlocked?

I have about 25 000 now I think and 6 tiles I think.

[1SlimShaney]

It seems to have balanced out now, Im back to gaining 50-100 a week. Honestly I think it might have just been my first death wave

[MarkJohnson]

Yeah, I'm sure that is all it was.

[きつね]

Prob down to the derp way service vechiles are assigned, - Send the herse to the otherside of the city to pick up one corpse, ignore building right next to us...

[King DaMuncha]

My city pop maxes at 360k, and every time theres a mass suicide it goes down to 260k.