Taxing and Patrolling... is it worth it?

[Squirrelloid]

The Demon: that's turns until the turn income is higher without overtaxing, yes? What about cumulative income? How long until the *total* income collected in the province is higher if you just let it go? (I'd check myself, but strangely enough i don't have excel on this computer - maybe i'll look tonight)

[TheDemon]

Originally Posted by Kobal2

Uh ? How come Growth 0 is more overtax profitable than Growth 3 ?

It's only relative profitability. Growth will always be more profitable in the absolute sense. But like I was saying earlier, growth isnt any sort of 'counter' for overtax losses.

Exactly. I didn't set my spreadsheet up to do comparisons because I was looking for the breakeven point. If you copy the whole thing to a new sheet, I'm sure you can set up a comparison column.

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

The Demon: that's turns until the turn income is higher without overtaxing, yes? What about cumulative income? How long until the *total* income collected in the province is higher if you just let it go? (I'd check myself, but strangely enough i don't have excel on this computer - maybe i'll look tonight)

I mentioned both.

For 30k pop:

At Growth 0, Growth 3, and Death 3, the last turn the income for 150% tax is greater than the income for 100% tax is turn 20, 19 and 21 respectively.

This is per turn income.

At Growth 0, the last turn the total income for 150% tax is greater than the total for 100% tax is turn 42.
At Growth 3, the last turn the total income for 150% tax is greater than the total for 100% tax is turn 39.
At Death 3, the last turn the total income for 150% tax is greater than the total for 100% tax is turn 45.

Total income = cumulative income

[Kobal2]

Originally Posted by TheDemon

Exactly. I didn't set my spreadsheet up to do comparisons because I was looking for the breakeven point. If you copy the whole thing to a new sheet, I'm sure you can set up a comparison column.

I get that, but it's still quite counter-intuitive that the scales which make population re-grow actually end up making a net loss faster than the scales that kill pop even faster.

[Soyweiser]

Originally Posted by Kobal2

I get that, but it's still quite counter-intuitive that the scales which make population re-grow actually end up making a net loss faster than the scales that kill pop even faster.

Net loss? Wow, I think you are interpreting it a bit wrong. It makes the overtaxing tactic less effective quicker. Because if you didn't overtax the pop that doesn't disappear would also grow quicker and raise your income quicker.

Say at turn 40 without growth the 100% cumulative income is 3000gold. But with growth 3 it is 4000k. Of course the point where the overtax would give less than these values comes earlier when the end number is higher.

[Kobal2]

Originally Posted by Soyweiser

Net loss? Wow, I think you are interpreting it a bit wrong. It makes the overtaxing tactic less effective quicker.

That's what I said, yes. Overtaxing starts making a net loss earlier with G3 than with G0, compared to 100% taxes with the same scales.

I realize the total income made during those 20ish turns will have been higher with G3 than G0 or D3. However, it is still very puzzling to me that G3 makes overtaxing less (relatively) effective, when you'd expect the pop regrowth would mitigate the pop loss from overtaxing and thus keep the overtaxing gravy train going a bit longer.

[Soyweiser]

Originally Posted by Kobal2

I realize the total income made during those 20ish turns will have been higher with G3 than G0 or D3. However, it is still very puzzling to me that G3 makes overtaxing less (relatively) effective, when you'd expect the pop regrowth would mitigate the pop loss from overtaxing and thus keep the overtaxing gravy train going a bit longer.

Then I would advice you never to get stock options or other financial stuff IRL. At least not without proper guidance.

[krpeters]

Originally Posted by Kobal2

However, it is still very puzzling to me that G3 makes overtaxing less (relatively) effective, when you'd expect the pop regrowth would mitigate the pop loss from overtaxing and thus keep the overtaxing gravy train going a bit longer.

You're looking at this backwards... look at it from a long term vs. short term perspective.

The purpose of overtaxing is to improve your short term at the expense of the long term. With a growth scale, your overtaxing is hurting a really good long term, so the short term gain comes at a high long term cost and hits breakeven quickly. With a death scale, your long term sucks anyway, so you're sacrificing little for what you gain, so breakeven occurs later.

[Mardagg]

Originally Posted by krpeters

You're looking at this backwards... look at it from a long term vs. short term perspective.

The purpose of overtaxing is to improve your short term at the expense of the long term. With a growth scale, your overtaxing is hurting a really good long term, so the short term gain comes at a high long term cost and hits breakeven quickly. With a death scale, your long term sucks anyway, so you're sacrificing little for what you gain, so breakeven occurs later.

it really isnt that simple.
The main purpose of overtaxing is to improve your short term income while still in Early game/early midgame.This is where any income advantage pays out fast on multiple levels.
(Think about it: how much could you do with 500 gold extra on turn 12,compared to 500 extra on turn 70? )

Since it is impossible to overtax many/all provinces that early,due to lack of patrollers for one of the many reasons,your whole example growth/death scale is basically nothing but theory since for most provinces the growth scale still has a big longterm gain.
In other words: you boost your early game start while still remaining competetive for the late game.

Another purpose of overtaxing could be in late game,when you know the final war starts soon and thus you dont have to worry about longterm pop loss.Taking a death scale here makes even less sense though,since you would have suffered already a lot until you get to the endgame.