Cotton

[marecone]

Cotton question. Do you ship it to Nassau and St. George? Do you get weapons for it or something else? Price changes?
I know, I know... New questions... I just can't help myself [:D]
Thank you for your answers.

[Kung Karl]

I like your questions. I check in every day to see if any new one is posted. This is because the developers are so nice to aswer wich makes your threads like previews of the game. Making me want it even more!

[marecone]

Thank you very much Karl. I was afraid that I am monopolizing this forum too much.

Godspeed,

[Kung Karl]

I would imagine that peopole could be a little annoyed if the questions were like "What color does the buttons have?" or "How long will the game take to load?".

But your questions are very well motivated and indeed informative when answered by the developers. What can be wrong with that? Nothing I say.


I wish I was in the land of cotton...

[Gil R.]

Cotton is not in "Forge of Freedom." We have simplified the economic/development aspects of the game from "Crown of Glory," so that the only resources are Money, Labor, Horses, and Iron (as well as points accumlated for the purchase of guns and railroad infrastructure).

(Actually, to be more accurate, cotton is indirectly in the game, since the CSA player can get the benefit of "Plantations," which produce money as well as horses, and a good chunk of that money would come from cotton.)

[marecone]

Hm... Well, I belive that cotton should be in the game but as I am not the creator of the game...
Ok. Cotton could be added on some future patch or add on. In my humble opinion it played a large part in ACW and it should be represented in the game.
Ofcourse, I would like to see this game ASAP [:D], so for now, I can live without it. [;)]

Godspeed

[Feralkoala]

It sounds like cotton is in the game, there just aren't "cotton points". Since cotton is really only valuable if you can break past the blockade and exchange it for money and perhaps iron (representing guns), simply allowing a blockade runner to get the cash seems reasonable.

To be honest, I'd be more afraid of the CSA if they allowed them the opportunity to invest in other crops. The historical allocations to cotton meant lots of wasted labor and lots of bales of the raw cotton just taking up warehouse space. Increased blockade runners would be a possibility, but the South simply lacked the capacity to build shipping on any kind of large-scale.

[Jasmo]

I assume the plantation only yeild money if the crops can be exported and blockades decrease the monetary yeild of plantation. The plantation crops in the south only had value if they could be exported. With the northern markets closed to them this means overseas markets which means rail links open to unblockaded ports, otherwise they produce no income.

[Gil R.]

As always, when developing a game it is necessary to weigh Historical Accuracy and Fun -- this balance requires not being so historically accurate that the game is no longer fun, just as it requires not being so fun that the game loses all accuracy. Another factor that has to be considered is complexity -- the more complex the game, the fewer people will like it. Some complexity is essential, but superfluous complexity is not. In "Forge of Freedom," cotton would be a neat feature, but it is not essential to having a realistic or enjoyable game: instead, having a resource called "Money" works very, very well. Each province in the game produces some amount of Money (as well as the three other resources). If that province is in Indiana, a lot of that Money probably comes from corn and other food crops; if that province is one of the major manufacturing centers of the North, a lot of that Money comes from manufacturing; and, if that province is in any of a number of southern states, a lot of that Money comes from production of cotton. And blockade-runners also do indeed factor into this: Confederate blockade-runners each turn have a chance of obtaining Money or one of the other resources (as well as weapons), so every time a blockade-runner brings back 40 Money that could very well be from cotton. As I am confident you will all see when the game is released, this simple economic system of relying on four resources works very well -- even without cotton.

[marecone]

Again Gil, thanks for your answer.
I hope you are not mad at us because we all started this cotton question.
It seems that both historical and fun part will be well represented.

[Gil R.]

Like Tony Soprano (= American TV character), I choose to focus my anger on those in my life who truly deserve it. No one on this forum has yet earned that status.

[archer1863]

Intersting side-note to the cotton-pickin thread...

It was actually proposed that due to the blockade that the bales be transported to Mexico, and loaded on European merchantmen.
Granted, the troubles with getting enough cargo to Mexico to make this a worthwhile venture would make this highly unlikely, but an interesting "What If" scenario arises...

U.S. Naval vessels intercepting European merchantmen. Like the Trent incident.[:D]

[Bombsight]

Cotton had better be considered. How else to account for Nathaniel Banks' two campaigns to invade Texas. The first in 1863 was overland and the second in 1864 was "nearly" successful; but, was terminated after the Battle of Mansfield. Both campaigns featured almost as many cotton speculators (a la Bull Run) accompanying the Army as there were troops!
 
N. Banks being a New England politician with Presidential aspirations was trying to placate the mill owners back home whose mills were running at half capacity.

[spruce]

ORIGINAL: Gil R.

As always, when developing a game it is necessary to weigh Historical Accuracy and Fun -- this balance requires not being so historically accurate that the game is no longer fun, just as it requires not being so fun that the game loses all accuracy. Another factor that has to be considered is complexity -- the more complex the game, the fewer people will like it. Some complexity is essential, but superfluous complexity is not. In "Forge of Freedom," cotton would be a neat feature, but it is not essential to having a realistic or enjoyable game: instead, having a resource called "Money" works very, very well. Each province in the game produces some amount of Money (as well as the three other resources). If that province is in Indiana, a lot of that Money probably comes from corn and other food crops; if that province is one of the major manufacturing centers of the North, a lot of that Money comes from manufacturing; and, if that province is in any of a number of southern states, a lot of that Money comes from production of cotton. And blockade-runners also do indeed factor into this: Confederate blockade-runners each turn have a chance of obtaining Money or one of the other resources (as well as weapons), so every time a blockade-runner brings back 40 Money that could very well be from cotton. As I am confident you will all see when the game is released, this simple economic system of relying on four resources works very well -- even without cotton.

how are blockade runners linked to the money production ? Does the blockade - no blockade runners getting trough - cut off the Souths life line "king cotton". Cause all that cotton was worthless on the local market ... too much supply for too few demand.

perhaps money production in the Southern provinces is tied to the blockade runners efficiency ... meaning plantations rely on export to have the full effect of it.

[Gil R.]

ORIGINAL: spruce

how are blockade runners linked to the money production ? Does the blockade - no blockade runners getting trough - cut off the Souths life line "king cotton". Cause all that cotton was worthless on the local market ... too much supply for too few demand.

perhaps money production in the Southern provinces is tied to the blockade runners efficiency ... meaning plantations rely on export to have the full effect of it.

Blockade-runners operate independently of the states' production. They go out to sea and, if lucky, bring back money or other resources. The quantity of such goods can be increased or decreased depending on the attitude of Britain, France or the other European powers, which the player partly influences.

The idea of linking plantations' production to them is an interesting one. At this point, we're not making any more changes to the game other than implementing graphics and checking balance issues, but I'd encourage you to post this idea once the game is out and we're soliciting suggestions on changes that could be implemented through patches.

[spruce]

Gil,

well I'm a little bit inspired on an older grand strategy civil war game (from Sumter to Appotomax). There you had the "seaons" where each season a pile of cotton was harvested. The trick was to get these cotton stocks on the blockade runner and to English or French ports. There you get a transfer from cotton to "supplies". Supplies was what the army and the people needed. A nice feature was that you could transfer cotton between ports by means of railroad movement. This means the Union can try to cut off one port, but other ports can take over capacity due to railroadmovement.

Some years ago I was reading quite intense on the internet about confederate blockade running as a means of income for their economy. The blockade runners were very profitable = the Southern economy was heavely depended on foreign trade, both for exporting their cotton and tabacco and importing military supplies and consumer goods. As soon as the blockade was installed, everything got expensive ... so the impact of the blockade should be very significant. In Forge of Freedom, blockade runners will behave like an extra bonus for money production - in reality the absence of blockade runners and the presence of Unionist blockade fleets should reduce the Southern income from money production to very low values - like a penalty of 75% ... not a bonus like you guys are suggesting.

Now back to Forge of Freedom - I think we can easely continue to abstract cotton production and stick with money production for each state =

- a blockade runner is assigned to a port (home port, seems logical imho),
- the south has major ports - either a few - or as many as you guys want to program (New Orleans, Charleston etc),
- each major port has a "hinterland". Meaning a major port is linked to the money production of some states,
- a major port acts as "buffer" or choke point for cotton transfer on to blockade runners,
- there will be a max. shipping capacity for each major port - f.e. it won't matter if you are runner either 100 or 200 blockade runners a month for a given major port - suppose the max. capacity for cotton is 10 blockade runners a month,
- now each port has a "flashy button" that tells the player how many blockade runners were successfull at making their mission this month - and how many were sunk (not all runners got sunk, but some runs were also not successfull),
- if a port is making it's quota - the serviced states receive all of their money production,
- if a port is making only a part of it's quote, that states money production will be severly damaged. F.e. the money production in Louisiana and Texas will be severly hampered if New Orleans is only making 25% of it's target ...
- a "free" port (that is making more runs then it's capacity - f.e. 20 blockade runners with max. transport capacity of 10) can take over capacity from other major ports - but with a transportation capacity malus. F.e. Louisiana could ship Tenessee cotton - normally going via Charleston if Charleston is heavely blockaded. Your railroad network has its limitations and this will be a constraint on Southern liberty in blockade running.

ok, some long text, but how does this translates into "easy to manage" ... well there are some major ports (I won't make too many, like 4 or 5) - the Union will dispatch blockade fleets or ships - the CSA will dispatch blockade runners. Depending on how much ships the Union can keep to blockade - and the amount of blockade runners there will be some ports having an effect on their transport capacity and as such impact state production. As long as the amount of blockaded ports is small, your railroad capacity can cover it (you just send the cotton to a "free port"), but with more and more ports being blockaded, the cotton will just sit there in the Southern docks ... having virtually no value ... what use is cotton if you can't sell it ? The local market doesn't need cotton ...

[spruce]

Gil,
 
off course you can always "change" the approach I gave here above. You reduce state money production to the point were local economy can handle the goods. Like Southern tobacco is worth money on American soil, but it would be worth much more if it's shipped to Europe were the customer is willing to pay more.
 
In this way - states have a small money production, but blockade runners have a bonus - to bring back to par with "default" money production during peace time. Off course the amount of blockade runners are not the cash cow themself, they are only a means of transportation and their bonus to money production isn't infinite.

[andysomers]

To me merely having blockade runners nearly resolves this "cotton" issue by itself. Their inclusion, I would say, inherently means they are exporting some wigit (be it cotton, tobacco, whiskey, rice, sugar cane, or whatever), then importing some other wigit (supplies, rifles, french wine, coffee, et al.). The only thing that we are saying is that the exports have to be moved from their point of production to a port city for shipping. The bottom line comes down to the question, what are the blockade runners exporting, and do you have to move these export goods to a port?

AS

[spruce]

ORIGINAL: andysomers

To me merely having blockade runners nearly resolves this "cotton" issue by itself. Their inclusion, I would say, inherently means they are exporting some wigit (be it cotton, tobacco, whiskey, rice, sugar cane, or whatever), then importing some other wigit (supplies, rifles, french wine, coffee, et al.). The only thing that we are saying is that the exports have to be moved from their point of production to a port city for shipping. The bottom line comes down to the question, what are the blockade runners exporting, and do you have to move these export goods to a port?

AS

I think the real bottomline is that the Southern Economy was totally different from f.e. an European economy. In the game "Crown of Glory" - that's located in Europe - there you get a malus on state (or province) production if the state (or province) is blockaded. In Forge of Glory you get a money production bonus if your blockade runners are successfull - no malus ... in fact this is absurd as the Southern Economy was not profitable without export - there was simply inferior local demand for the enormous supply of cotton and tabacco. I recall the internet foto's of stocks of cotton just rotting away in Southern ports due to the blockade. The Southern economy was so unflexible that they had one of the biggest agricultural potential - yet cotton was rotting in blockaded ports and the food production from the agriculture was too limited ...

[Gil R.]

Spruce,

You make good points and have some very interesting ideas (I especially like the idea of linking blockade-runners to particular ports), but unfortunately at this point it is impossible to implement any of them because they would involve major programming and reprogramming plus reworking of several graphics (especially certain screens). We can't delay the game's release by a month to make such changes. That said, once the game is out and (I hope) you've had a chance to play it and get a feel for it, if you think we should make these or other changes then you should definitely suggest them again. The one thing I'd point out is that our first game, "Crown of Glory," used the same engine but had a very complex economic and commercial system, and this appears to have turned off a lot of customers and potential customers who don't value complexity -- and adding such detailed features to the game as designating through which port a cotton shipment must go might have a similar effect on a lot of people who don't enjoy that sort of thing. But this is why it would be a good discussion to have when 1) you and others have played the game and 2) there are many more people visiting this forum who could give input on this issue.

Andysomers,
Blockade-runners function in the abstract, bringing in Guns, Money, Horses, Labor or Iron (our five resources, with which everything in the game is built or purchased), but not expending money for them. If they return with money that probably means they were selling something, but the game doesn't say what it was. If blockade-runners come back with Guns, this would mean either that they had purchased the weapons or that these had been given by a European power. Now, I realize that you or someone else will object to the notion of blockade-runners not laying out any cash to get the resources they bring back, but blockade-runners are very expensive (they cost 150 money, which is quite a lot in FOF), so essentially it is understood that some of the money that went into creating these units is used to help them purchase whatever it is that they bring back. Again, this is in the abstract, but we feel that it does make sense to do it this way.