Building infrastructure before factories

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

One of the most recent patches allowed infrastructure build speed to now benefit from existing infrastructure, which didnt happen previously. Doesnt sound like too huge a deal, but actually changes up its investment value quite a bit.

Because I have a strange idea of what I consider entertaining, I went ahead and ran some numbers in a spreadsheet, and heres what I found for the number of available building slots for infrastructure to have “return on investment” when built in a singular region, then maxing out on civilian factories in that region (this is assuming Export Focus and no other national spirits for simplicity, 15/15 civilian factories being used):

Civilian Economy, 4/5 existing infra - 4.04
Partial Mob/War Economy, 4/5 existing infra - 5.56
Civilian Economy, 3/5 existing infra - 3.64
Partial Mob/War Economy, 3/5 existing infra - 5

If someone else found different values than what I did and I screwed up in some way, by all means let me know so Im not working with faulty data.

Other considerations/observations:
-if you go straight for a civ factory instead of infrastructure, of course the one you build quicker will provide construction on its own, so that would be a plus to going civ instead of infra. However, this isnt THAT huge, as it will only provide around 1.5% of a civilian factory’s cost before infrastructure first will catch up and finish its first civ factory. This can add up per civ factory “delayed” to the point it can be significant, especially if you dont have enough factories to get 15/15 (longer delay before the civ is made)

-existing resources in an area can definitely matter. If a region is resource rich AND has 4+ building slots available, its a nice incentive. More resources can help you save civ trading, or even help gain more civs from exports under specific circumstances.

-infrastructure is nice for more than just civilian factory build speed. Supply often matters, and if you need to build radars, railroads, docks etc in a regioninfrastructure atill helps all of that. Dont recall if it effects repair speed

-civilian economy has debuffs for factory build speed, but not infrastructure. A lot of nations like France start and are stuck in civilian economy for a while, so theres extra incentive to go infrastructure first. This is even more dramatic for the USA in undisturbed isolation (-50% to factory build speed)

-this is assuming only immediate/early benefits. As your industry research increases, you will open up more building slots in regions. So even if you start with only 4 open building slots, you can end up getting 6+ more as the game goes on, and your infrastructure will continue benefitting you in that region as soon as theyre unlocked

-not entirely sure if consumer goods impacts this in any way

Thoughts? Comments? Oversights? Observations that theres way too much thought going into something that has inconsequentially minor impact? (If you think this is bad wait until you hear about civilian factory build priority micro)

 

[Corpse Fool]

Construction speed boosts only matter if they would treat your factories or infra differently, so your trade law doesnt matter.

 

[Silverhood]

Construction speed boosts only matter if they would treat your factories or infra differently, so your trade law doesnt matter.

I think he means that if you have 6-7 spare resources for export, and a trade law change could boost that to 8+ , you could potentially get one or more civs from trade. If building infrastructure pushes you to above 8 spare resources, then building one infra could also result in a civ from trade, assuming your trade law allows it to be exported.

 

[Dimmie_Dumm]

Given how Radars, Ports etc. are all affected, building infra to level 5 seems pretty much a no-brainer to me; provided you intend building up the region in the first place. I.e. it's now all-or-nothing.

 

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

Construction speed boosts only matter if they would treat your factories or infra differently, so your trade law doesnt matter.

It does in a very slight way. I did some tests out of curiosity, to see how construction research impacted the outcomes. Basically it did not, except if the Economy Law put the modifier in the negative. In other words, a 5% boost from -20% to -15% seemed to make a (very slight) bigger difference than 10% to 15%. And as Silverhood correctly interpreted (thanks!), if the infra pushes your exported resources to +8 your might actually get another civ factory in an export trade. This can matter sometimes for nonaligned minors in a small way. Or of course help you save some civs by no longer having to import as much.

But this is extremely minor and youre right, I only gave the Trade Law as a variable in case someone was doing their own comparison.

 

[Corpse Fool]

It does in a very slight way. I did some tests out of curiosity, to see how construction research impacted the outcomes. Basically it did not, except if the Economy Law put the modifier in the negative. In other words, a 5% boost from -20% to -15% seemed to make a (very slight) bigger difference than 10% to 15%. And as Silverhood correctly interpreted (thanks!), if the infra pushes your exported resources to +8 your might actually get another civ factory in an export trade. This can matter sometimes for nonaligned minors in a small way. Or of course help you save some civs by no longer having to import as much.

But this is extremely minor and youre right, I only gave the Trade Law as a variable in case someone was doing their own comparison.

I'm very curious what sort of data led you to the conclusion that having the same multiplier on each thing, regardless of what that multiplier is, will have a different effect on the results.

 

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

I'm very curious what sort of data led you to the conclusion that having the same multiplier on each thing, regardless of what that multiplier is, will have a different effect on the results.

Just as an example:

75*1.8*(1-0.25)=101.25
75*1.8*(1-0.2)=108
~6.7% difference

75*1.8*(1+0.1)=148.5
75*1.8*(1+0.15)=155.25
~4.5% difference

Both changes from 5% construction speed modifier.

Diminishing returns when there is another multiplicative separate factor, unless there is a miscalculation Im making somewhere.

 

[Corpse Fool]

unless there is a miscalculation Im making somewhere.

I don't think its a miscalculation, but more of a misusage of calculations. Within the context of the conversation, the 1 +/- X shouldn't be changing, the 1.8 should be changing.

The 1 +/- X changing only matters if it ends up not being the same value applied to both the infrastructure and whatever else you're building, generally civ factories. Yes, the democracies and especially USA get hit the hardest by this because of civ-eco or UDI, but I at least consider those to be the exceptions rather than the rule. There is a larger pool of economic laws that do not have a lopsided bonus than those that do, and by the nature of those considerations being more complicated I would consider them to be the 'next level' if we wanted to dive deeper for more detail.

After we establish the foundation, we bring in the exceptions like the various other eco laws and combine those with a variety of other construction speed boosts to show how much of a swing those considerations make.

 

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

I don't think its a miscalculation, but more of a misusage of calculations. Within the context of the conversation, the 1 +/- X shouldn't be changing, the 1.8 should be changing.

The 1 +/- X changing only matters if it ends up not being the same value applied to both the infrastructure and whatever else you're building, generally civ factories. Yes, the democracies and especially USA get hit the hardest by this because of civ-eco or UDI, but I at least consider those to be the exceptions rather than the rule. There is a larger pool of economic laws that do not have a lopsided bonus than those that do, and by the nature of those considerations being more complicated I would consider them to be the 'next level' if we wanted to dive deeper for more detail.

After we establish the foundation, we bring in the exceptions like the various other eco laws and combine those with a variety of other construction speed boosts to show how much of a swing those considerations

Right, but a higher infrastructure bonus (ie 1.8 to 2) means that there would be more of the diminishing returns impact. So that 5% granted by say Free Trade compared to Export Focus would be more impactful when infrastructure was higher, relative to when the construction bonus was already high…Im probably explaining myself poorly but I hope you get the gist of it lol.

But I digress, like I said it was a minor consideration after the fact for my own curiosity that made tiny changes, the real meat of the calculations was in the default starting situations for most nations, and then I tried to include situational criteria for sort of “tiebreaker” type scenarios when youre faced with say 4 or 5 open building slots, where its somewhat ambiguous of whether it would pay off to construct infrastructure or not.

There are a lot of nations that start out in civilian economy, so I thought it was worth highlighting for an ‘opening move’ of what to build. Some can quickly switch off to a better economy law, but others have other priorities like a silent workhorse, ideological demagogue, spending pp to manage a million national spirit debuffs, or simply because they dont have enough war support to change out (like France). Consequently, by the time you can switch out of civ economy, enough time has passed that you couldve built at least 1 infrastructure improvement.

As is, in many cases it seems like a good strategy is to go infrastructure->civilian factories while stuck in civilian economy, and then just factories will be fine once you can switch out to partial mobilization or war economy. That said, even someone like Germany would seemingly benefit from getting infrastructure in regions where they have 6 building slots available.

 

[Corpse Fool]

Right, but a higher infrastructure bonus (ie 1.8 to 2) means that there would be more of the diminishing returns impact. So that 5% granted by say Free Trade compared to Export Focus would be more impactful when infrastructure was higher, relative to when the construction bonus was already high…Im probably explaining myself poorly but I hope you get the gist of it lol.

It is the same. I'm going to chop all of the IC costs by 5 and call it FD (factory*days), so infra is 1200 FD and a civ is 2160, because that is a more worthwhile number. I'm sure the artificial inflation of the numbers only serves to give the devs a quick way to adjust the power of all construction/production without having to go through each building/equipment/ship and adjust costs individually, but I still don't like it.

If we assume the same 1.8x from level 4 infra, with 100% construction speed building the infra costs ~667 FD and saves 120 FD per factory, so we would need 5.55~ (6) factories for the infra to have been worth it. If we double the basic construction speed up to 200%, it costs ~334 FD to build the infra and that saves all of 60 FD per factory now. Which is still, 5.55~ (6) factories required for building the infrastructure to be worth it.

The only time the construction speed matters in this comparison, is when it would change the cost ratio between infra and whatever you're building. Whenever the infra is comparatively more expensive (though penalties to civs, or just extra boosts to infra), you require less factories for the infra to be worthwhile. And vice versa. It should be noted that as the 'base' construction speed increases, the additive modifiers are having less and less of an impact.

 

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

The only time the construction speed matters in this comparison, is when it would change the cost ratio between infra and whatever you're building. Whenever the infra is comparatively more expensive (though penalties to civs, or just extra boosts to infra), you require less factories for the infra to be worthwhile. And vice versa. It should be noted that as the 'base' construction speed increases, the additive modifiers are having less and less of an impact.

Right, but this last part is what is happening with a universal bonus, as you first calculate the impact it has on infrastructure and then factor in the effect it later has on the civ factories that youre building after the infrastructure. The universal bonus comparatively impacts one more than the other, so the cost ratio changes, no?

Its tiny and insignificant however, so while I find this a fun math problem I wouldnt want the topic to get too derailed by it lol

 

[Corpse Fool]

Its tiny and insignificant however, so while I find this a fun math problem I wouldnt want the topic to get too derailed by it lol

I must not be understanding what you're trying to say.
If you have 20 and divide it by 10, we get 2. If we take half of 20 to get 10, and take half of 10 to get 5, and do 10 divided by 5, we still get 2. If we apply the same multiplier to both sides, the ratio between them is still the same.

 

[MR2]

Playing as Germany, I've started concentrating my building by Air Defense Zones ADZ. I start w Eastern Germany, a frequent target for everyone's Strat bombers and everything Commonwealth. That's nine provinces - 2x 4/5 and 7x 3/5 infrastructure. Brandenburg (4/5) also has 2xAA, so I start there by maxing Civ for the first slot. The next slot is reserved for maxing the next highest Infra within the ADZ. Once the first ADZ is maxxed, I start on the Western Germany ADZ. In 1938, I wrap up infra production and switch to Mils. Infra still gets full time use of that second production que. In early 1939, I will toss one AA into all of the provinces in the two maxed ADZ.

National Focus Reichsautobahn... 70 days and it only gives you 6 infra. Unfortunately, you cannot bypass this focus by maxing the infra in the affected 4 provinces. So going for the War Economy Focus and the additional 6x Mil requires you to spend 140 days (and 140PP).

For me, I want the infra sooner and will spend to max those provinces and hopefully will have plenty more Mils due to that infra building. I typically will spend the 150pp to switch to War Econ much earlier than by focus.. That 140d/140pp will be used on Air/Army Innovations for example.

This is an ongoing experiment that has shown promising results so far.

 

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

I must not be understanding what you're trying to say.
If you have 20 and divide it by 10, we get 2. If we take half of 20 to get 10, and take half of 10 to get 5, and do 10 divided by 5, we still get 2. If we apply the same multiplier to both sides, the ratio between them is still the same.

Best I can do is by a direct example from the spreadsheet. Civilian Economy, 15/15 factories, starting 10% bonus to construction speed from Export Focus. Days meaning time to build.

Civ factory: 10800/(75*1.8*0.8)=100 days
Infrastructure: 6000/(75*1.8*1.1)=40.4 days
Civ factory after infra upgrade: 10800/(75*2*0.8)=90 days
40.4 days / (100-90 days) = 4.04 building slots to break even

Now with a 10% universal construction speed bonus…
Civ factory: 10800/(75*1.8*0.9)=88.89 days
Infrastructure: 6000/(75*1.8*1.2)=37 days
Civ factory after infra upgrade: 10800/(75*2*0.9)=80 days
37 days/ (88.89-80 days) = ~4.17 building slots to break even.

A (very) slight change in the break even requirements.

 

[Corpse Fool]

Alright, I see what the problem is.

Civilian Economy

You aren't applying the same mod to both infra and non-infra. Which is a requirement for my saying that it doesn't matter.

 

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

Alright, I see what the problem is.



You aren't applying the same mod to both infra and non-infra. Which is a requirement for my saying that it doesn't matter.

But civilian economy doesnt effect infrastructure construction speed, while it has a malus towards non-infra construction speed, correct? So one (civs) have -30% + 10% build speed, and the other (infra) has 0 + 10% build speed. Even though the additive change of 10% is the same.

Under ‘neutral’ circumstances like Partial Mob and up I of course agree, comparing infra vs civs, which both have starting modifiers of 0% before anything else.

 

[Corpse Fool]

Even though the additive change of 10% is the sane.

-30+10 != 0+10. You're putting different total modifiers on either side, you aren't treating them both the same.

 

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

-30+10 != 0+10. You're putting different total modifiers on either side, you aren't treating them both the same.

But you cant treat them the same because civilian economy specifically modifies one but not the other…?

 

[Corpse Fool]

But you cant treat them the same because civilian economy specifically modifies one but not the other…?

If you're under the effects of something like civ eco that specifically adjusts whatever you're building more/less than what it adjusts infra, yes, you naturally can't treat them the same. But like I said earlier, no matter how common it is to start with those sorts of conditions, I consider them to be the exception rather than the rule.

So ultimately what you need is a 'generic' table that works regardless of these exceptions for whatever buildings you're going to be wanting to build, and then also have another set of tables for each building you want to build, and each various combination of relevent speeds to see where the breakpoints are.

And then I suppose you could take to the game scenario and apply the information gained from those tables to specific nations under specific conditions with specific amounts of infrastructure and slots available in their states, to suggest to players a way to utilize their construction queue.

But the short of it is, infra boosting infra flips the switch from "No" in the before times to "Yes". Infra structure is a lot better to build.

 

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

If you're under the effects of something like civ eco that specifically adjusts whatever you're building more/less than what it adjusts infra, yes, you naturally can't treat them the same. But like I said earlier, no matter how common it is to start with those sorts of conditions, I consider them to be the exception rather than the rule.

So ultimately what you need is a 'generic' table that works regardless of these exceptions for whatever buildings you're going to be wanting to build, and then also have another set of tables for each building you want to build, and each various combination of relevent speeds to see where the breakpoints are.

And then I suppose you could take to the game scenario and apply the information gained from those tables to specific nations under specific conditions with specific amounts of infrastructure and slots available in their states, to suggest to players a way to utilize their construction queue.

But the short of it is, infra boosting infra flips the switch from "No" in the before times to "Yes". Infra structure is a lot better to build.

Ah okay, I get you. Like I said previously, I dont consider civilian economy to be the exception simply because so many nations start or are stuck in civilian economy, and early construction choices have more impact down the line than ones later. Other than the fascist nations, all majors start as civilian economy (or worse), and countless minors do as well (and can be stuck in it for a while), so I personally find that significant.

However, I can meet you in the middle and agree that in terms of total play time of most nations, you will be spending it in partial mobilization or higher, which means you can treat the modifiers the same.

I think its easy enough to look at available building slots in your nation and decide if its worthwhile to build infra based on the data I found, and enough wiggle room considerations if you need “tiebreaker” criteria. Getting too specific with individual nations’ build order would make it messier than Im willing to do lol since there will always be multiple approaches and strategies