Not making money

[bulldog.berg]

I keep losing money. I have played all of the previous Tropicos and never had a problem making money. I have 2 boat factories and three rum factories. They are fully supplied and staffed. The teamsters are keeping them managed. Everything is built around the places of work to reduce travel. I have also watched videos and read articles on how to make money. I have even used cheats to eliminate possible variables such as happiness, unlimited money, resources, and etc. Nothing is working.
I started by building more production and factories. It seems the more I build the faster I lose money. What am I missing? Is this a bug in my game? I am at a loss. Please help.

[Spectre]

Originally posted by bulldog.berg:

I started by building more production and factories. It seems the more I build the faster I lose money.

Lol don't do that. When I first played this game during the free weekend, my first mistake was expanding the production and industry too fast without considering other factors. Making money in this game is different from the previous games.

I have to ask. How are the needs met for your workers? Are buildings like a house, clinic or an entertainment building relatively close to the workplace or far away? How are the wages set? Did you try setting the wages to max to see if that helps? The way how this game is designed is that your workers work in shifts meaning that you will see some workers there making the stuff while others are off somewhere on break to satisfy their needs. There's also an edict in the colonial era section that lets your industry workers work twice the shifts.

For example, if you see all workers grayed out or transparent, it means either they're traveling to the workplace or someplace else to satisfy their needs. Workers not there = items won't be produced. Highlighted workers = items will be produced. I hope it helps.

[Zephyr]

It is quite frequent at the beginning of missions to run in the red, or even DEEPLY in the red, before it gets better. At least for me. The reason being most missions have very bad economies or poorly done starting ones, or bad placement, or what have you.

I would say it's a about pacing. Build the basis of your economy when you have money, then wait until the boats take away what you made before adding to it again. The boats rythtm your progression, so to speak. Start by the base, and build up(primary ressources first, then upgrading them, then industry to transform them).

Few tips though:

-When you have made a decent economy chain, such as securing one or two industries, get your research started. There are 2, or 3 edicts I deem absolutely mandatory. The first one is employee of the month, as it will make your industries and mines work double shift. The difference between without and with are night and day. Especially when it's fully leveled. The second is faster boat services. It means more frequent boats to take your stuff and as such more frequent income. Also speed up all others boats, so good all around. Third one is in my opinion child allowance, as having children otherwise lower the wealth of a family, cutting their access to the best possible houses. That's for the first era. Others have good ones too.

-Play the trading game. Try to secure the best possible trade routes for the products you export. a 32% boost on export price for your boats or your rum is a huge boost. If you don't have good opportunities of products you can export, then try to see what you can import. Even if you don't need it, importing stuff at a discount is pretty much printing money. If you can import stuff at -15%, you make a nice profit. If you manage to import stuff at -15% and sell it at 132% of the price, you're making out like a bandit. Don't puchase too many trading licenses though, the cost is incremental, so only buy a few ones at first, then buy more when you get more money. It's all about pacing.

-Houses are actually making you money. Tropicans pay every month, so building housing early enough will make said housing pay for itself eventually(may take a bit of time, but it will happen). Still, prioritize actual money making building providing jobs in priority. Don't care too much about people being in shack, they can wait as long as they aren't causing issues, or close to.

-If you are losing money faster than you are making it, consider cutting the budget of some of your buildings. Check your finances and see where are the biggest source of expenses, then cut into that. Be aware though it will cause a decrease in efficiency, but it's that or not making any money at all. Once you're back in the green, you can always rise it again.

[info.fare]

Very nice - I fully agree! One question about your experience with the "trading-game". I act like you and it is powerful. I am just not sure, if it is clever, to import the same goods, which you also export. I didn't try it, yet - but/because I fear, that it leads to stocking-problems at the harbour. I don't know, in which order/sequence, the game-engine handles imports/exports.

P.S.: I only play with 1 harbour (after first having plenty), because I experienced no disadvantages despite longer breaks for next income.

[Zephyr]

You can only import 1000 units of any resource by boat arriving, so it should never exceed the stockpile of goods, as it should take a BIG production to manage to stockpile 10k units of any material your sell(it's different if it's one you deactivated for selling).

The thing I love, is that the same boat that will arrive to deliver a cargo of say 1000 logs, will also take the 1000 logs from the previous boat and pay you for it. It's silly.

That's an other point actually. At some era, you may want to make some resources not for sale in your trading section. It's true for everything that is mined and oil, as those resources are finite, and can be transformed into something of better value. Granted in Tropico 6 mineral deposits are gigantic and you rarely exhaust one(it's never happened to me, but then again I'm cautious).

My general rule is the same I applied in Tropico 5. Only mine a ressource if you can transform it into a finished product, the end of the chain so to speak. In world wars, you can make steel and get nickel to make weapons, and while you can make jewelry with gold if needed, it's better to wait until modern times to turn that gold into electronics with plastic. Cold war is when you can make boats out of aluminium. Oil is less a problem, as you can make plastic out of corn, and pharmaceuticals out of sugar, so you can tap into it to make those products as soon as they are available.

[info.fare]

Thanks! I didn't know, that even the SAME boat will export goods, I imported. That's nice :-)
I feared, that Game-Engine waits with export until whole (!) amount of import arrived.

Raw-materials I also like to block for export. Especially the mined ressources. Honestly I experienced the same like you (never exhausted), but I also still am careful. On top, I have "just-in-case" a piggy-bank with the stock of blocked export-goods.

[Zephyr]

Technically the same boat doesn't export the good you imported, as I explained, it's the NEXT boat which takes the goods you imported with the first boat. But seeing the second boat also comes with imports... it's pretty much the boat paying you just to get into the harbour.