Weighted average quality

Ideas how the game could be improved and suggestions for subsequent versions of the game. (this is just a space for ideas! We can't guarantee suggestions will be implemented!)

Moderator: moderators

Post Reply
Guest

Weighted average quality

Post by Guest » 21.03.2007, 22:55

As is frequently the case with suggestions, I'd settle for a good explanation why it is the way it is.

Anyway, why is quality based on a straight average of all inputs? That rings quite false to me. For example, in a wine grape quality is crucial. Also important is the process, and I suppose how well it's sweetened matters somewhat. But the glass? A wine made from quality 0 grapes and 25 glass is just as good as one made with 0 glass and 25 grapes? That's not how I buy my wine!

Wine ingredients are:
20 kg Grapes
0.3 kg Sugar
0.5 Liter Water
0.2 kg Glass
And of course the wine tech itself.

So if I have q5 grapes, q2 Sugar, q0 Water, q0 glass, and q3 Wine tech that's a 2 product on the straight average.

But I get the same from q0 grapes, q0 sugar, q0 water, q10 glass, and q0 Wine. This makes no sense to me. That'd be terrible wine in a pretty bottle. I drank that stuff in college, and it does not pass for quality wine I assure you! :D

So why not just assign some value to the tech and then do a weighted average? For example, tech weight = 10

20 * 5
.3 * 2
.5 * 0
.2 * 0
10 * 3
-------
130.6 / 31 = q4 product from good grapes and tech. Meanwhile ...

20 * 0
.3 * 0
.5 * 0
.2 * 10
10 * 0
-------
2 / 31 = q0 wine. Which makes more sense.

And of course there are other products where glass is more important.

In the second iteration, we could assign values to each component separate from their input qualities. For example, E-components are more important to a Television than plastic despite 1 of them to 5 plastic kg. But in the meantime, inputs are an easy way to weight. Just to open the door.

So I ask, why not weighted averages for quality?

Guest

Post by Guest » 21.03.2007, 23:50

Its that way because this is a game, not reality.

Guest

Post by Guest » 22.03.2007, 07:55

Edit: For Those On A PSP or A Phone - STOP READING NOW ... This is LONG, DETAILED, and I bet u will complain about the length of it.

ur also thinking of 'quality' as a taste ... u have to realize that quality is more of a product or brand than a taste ...

if uve ever been to a winery, u have to realize that they want the best of the best for their wines ... only the BEST bottles, onlythe BEST grapes, only the BEST water (in this case, water cant change) ... but u get my drift ... the 'better' wine isnt just the stuff that comes out, its the entire product as a whole ...

Example to kill ur idea -- -- do u have a mine? check out the diamonds ...
Diamonds
Required:
1000 kWh Power
100 Liter Water
by ur suggestion - u would need to research diamonds to 110 before u get a Q1 ...

suggestion killer 2:
the main producer of money for people right now is Oil/Gas... Oil is killer ...
Oil
Required: 100 kWh Power
You would need Q10 Oil Research to create Q1 Oil ...
And i believe there are only 2 people in the game that have Q20+ oil researched at the moment (i could be wrong) ... so there would only be Q2 Oil floating around ...

Now...
Gas:
Required: 0.2 hl Oil 5 kWh Power
Woah ... Research Gas 1 and ur through the roof.

Ur suggestion would completely undermine the 'basic' products research, and skip right to End Product (those that are sold to stores) research ...

its all well and good for products that have a low power and water and stone rate, but products that have high amounts of products which cannot have their quality raised will stay zero forever.

edit: sorry, didnt see u had Tech as 10 ... i thought i was getting to research 1100 :shock: :lol:

Guest

Post by Guest » 22.03.2007, 08:31

Most every product requires power or water, and many require both. The real problem with more complex products, is having to factor in all those 0 values. IF water and power were defaulted to 1, it would change the entire dynamic of this, and enable a much higher Q for final product. I understand this isn't going to happen, but I am just saying... IF... :wink:

Guest

Post by Guest » 22.03.2007, 13:10

Right, power and water, measured as they are, are warping factors. But their units of measurement are also somewhat arbitrary. Instead of using 300 kWh of power it could be 0.3 MWh. I realize that, just wanted to get someone on the hook for discussion first. :)

With Method 1, weighting by inputs, the proper solution would probably be to just exlude water and power from the calculation. They're present in huge quantities and always q0 so just don't average them in.

With Method 2, custom weighting (which is the better way to go), that's not a factor at all. For each recipe we simply decide how important every aspect is, and give every product an appropriate weighting. Diamonds could be 1 weight for research and 0 for water and power, or ..5 and .25 each, or whatever mix feels appropriate.

Even the loftiest goal would only take one extra column on the recipes table, a tiny increase in size. And the SQL to change from a simple average to a weighted one is not considerably more difficult either.

Guest

Post by Guest » 22.03.2007, 14:18

And then all the programmers would have to do is tweak the program a little bit so that the inherent advantage of having a higher quality product is reduced. So, what you might now see as a benefit in changing your quality from Q2 to Q3 (ability to charge higher prices, and shorter selling times) would then require you to improve your product from Q2 to Q6 to see the same benefit.

Bottom line, as long as it's uniform for everybody, it doesn't really matter to me how the quality is calculated. Yes, it will look nice that you're jumping up levels of quality faster, but that just means that your competitors are jumping up levels just as fast.

Post Reply