I was also under the impression that growth/death shouldn't affect gold for abysia. Are you sure it's the scale that's causing the difference? If there's variation in starting population or terrain type then that could explain the gold differences
Maybe they're spending the 2% of their income on care for the sick and dying, or the population in general is less healthy and thus less able to do whatever it is that produces your tax income...the people still feel the effects of the scale, they just don't care if the crops go bad. It's not a very useful mechanic for them, overall, just kind of a flavor thing, I guess.
Abysia is not supposed to see any supply or gold income effects from the growth/death scale, just the population effects. Unfortunately, since Abysians are fire mages and are already shorter-lived than humans, they really can't afford to take a death scale.
It was the same pop (capitol) and the same situation (heat 3). The _only_ difference is the growth scale. I'm positive, Abysia _does_ now benefit from the growth scale, but it should _not_.
Greame Dice : you're right for the old age penalty, but 120 more design points and no gold penalty on a large map was too tempting
Cheers