Performance impact of construction cycle time?

[linkxsc (OP)]

So playing around with settings again. If you shorten the construction cycle time when making a game, stuff gets built in a more accurate manner, but it murders your play speed cause of all the checks every cycle. Would this conversely boost my performance a bit if I raised it from a 5 day timer to say a 10 day or 15 day?

[83athom]

Yes, that is kind of implied.

[MarcAFK]

I believe doubling the cycle time also halves construction speed, but don't quote me on that.

[Father Tim]

I believe doubling the cycle time also halves construction speed, but don't quote me on that.

1.  HAH!  I'll quote you if I want, because I'm anarchistic like that.

2.  It doesn't, as most construction/production/research etc. is calculated based on the number of seconds since the last production cycle.  (Otherwise, advancing time 30 days would result in 1/6th of the proper growth.)  Note, however, that some things (like officer skill increases and communication checks) do grow more slowly with longer cycles, due to Steve not working out all the math for the proper exponential formula.

2a.  Also, in the areas where you can't queue production (Ground Force Training is the first to come to mind) your overall build rate will be slower due to extended 'dead time' between items.

2b.  Due to the 'calculated by seconds' factor mentioned above, going to a very short construction cycle (an hour, say) can cause your progress to get rounded down to 0, and you end up not making any progress unless you advance time by a day or so.

[sloanjh]

2.  It doesn't, as most construction/production/research etc. is calculated based on the number of seconds since the last production cycle.  (Otherwise, advancing time 30 days would result in 1/6th of the proper growth.)  Note, however, that some things (like officer skill increases and communication checks) do grow more slowly with longer cycles, due to Steve not working out all the math for the proper exponential formula.

To clarify "Steve not working out the math", there are (at least) two possible failure modes:

2c.  If the multiplicative factor to reach e.g. 10% increase in 1 year with 5 day cycles is (1  + epsilon), then for a 30 day cycle he should use (1 + epsilon)^6, rather than (1 + 6*epsilon).  This one is fairly benign (since the error in the growth rate will only be roughly 15*epsilon, which is still pretty small).  I think this is the approximation Steve uses most of the time (for example in construction rate).

2d.  Steve just forgot to change the rate.  So for 5 day AND for 30 day cycles BOTH he would multiply by (1 + epsilon).  This is a significant error, and I believe it is what MarcAFK is referring to.  That being said, my recollection is that this error is in MUCH more obscure parts of the code than construction rate, such as officer skill increases or communication checks.  I have no idea if Steve has fixed the problem and/or which parts of the code it shows up in if he hasn't.

I'm not sure whether Father Tim is referring to 2c or 2d in his item 2.

John

[gamedesign69]

Not to hijack this thread, but I'm curious as to what construction cycle time most people play with.  I tend to use 100000 myself. 

[Bgreman]

I also use 100,000, though in retrospect it might have been wiser to just go with 86,400.

[MarcAFK]

I generally use default, though a few times I have either halved it or doubled it for no real reason.