irrelevant: Frenchman's Bend: trying for a soft landing

[Nilla]

I can see, you are still increasing the number of houses, not much, but still increasing, same as your population. Can you explain your strategie?

And @RedKetchup, I like these little houses, too. I bild no others in my slow Doolin, using the different colors of the roof, to make it look a bit funny. (although the brownish roofs might be the most realistic)

[RedKetchup]

I can see, you are still increasing the number of houses, not much, but still increasing, same as your population. Can you explain your strategie?

And @RedKetchup, I like these little houses, too. I bild no others in my slow Doolin, using the different colors of the roof, to make it look a bit funny. (although the brownish roofs might be the most realistic)

i can say something : these colorful little house are the ***MOST*** beautiful building in the game, never been equal-ed so far and nothing gets near neither




Edit: Fixed TYPO lol

[irrelevant]

I can see, you are still increasing the number of houses, not much, but still increasing, same as your population. Can you explain your strategie?

@Nilla Tapering off building houses, was two per year, now one per year for the past three years, soon one every other year, eventually none?

Upgrading houses may have been a mistake, it really seemed to cause new families to form, although I'm pretty sure they would have formed anyway. Shuffling such a large portion of the pop out of their homes and then back in may have accelerated the process, but it seems to happen pretty quickly on its own.

Right now children are 18% of pop which seems a bit too high. Hoping as I taper off house-building this % will edge its way down below 15%, which is where I will think about ceasing to build houses.

[rkelly17]

Right now children are 18% of pop which seems a bit too high. Hoping as I taper off house-building this % will edge its way down below 15%, which is where I will think about ceasing to build houses.

What I would like to hear about as you go on is when the cycle of population begins to kick in. I'm assuming that you will get what many others have seen--population drops as couples age beyond childbearing but continue to occupy houses, then swings up as those couples die and new couples move in and have babies. Does one house per year hold off the cycle? Does one house every other year? Inquiring minds want to know.

One precursor of the cycle might be a drop in the number of children, which is usually a harbinger of general population decline.

[irrelevant]

Year 52

Buncha old farts died, buncha young folk hooked up in the empty houses, buncha babies were born. Not going to get caught up into chasing the feedback. Still one house per year, even though the pop curve has soared.

[irrelevant]

Between family holiday stuff, and trying to get caught up at work stuff, have had no time for Frenchman's Bend  Hopefully get some free time this evening.

[irrelevant]

What I would like to hear about as you go on is when the cycle of population begins to kick in. I'm assuming that you will get what many others have seen--population drops as couples age beyond childbearing but continue to occupy houses, then swings up as those couples die and new couples move in and have babies. Does one house per year hold off the cycle? Does one house every other year? Inquiring minds want to know.

One precursor of the cycle might be a drop in the number of children, which is usually a harbinger of general population decline.

Even though I haven't had any game time, I have been thinking about it a lot. The recent rise in pop has me concerned; with little new housing available for the generation now coming up, am I just baking in a pop crash? Is it reasonable to think that pop 350 is sustainable (if indeed any pop is), or just wishful thinking? Does it even make sense to be tapering off building houses at all? Going to keep a close watch on the demographics in the coming years, as far as that is possible, particularly the ages of the females moving into new houses.

Speaking of demographics, this game cries out for the capability to download the details of the citizens into a spreadsheet. One row per bannie, with sex, age, marital status, something to identify what house they are in, what year they moved into their house, etc. Probably not possible but would be oh so useful to us beancounter types!

[Nilla]

Yes Mr Beancounter, I have been thinking a bit about this too. I am pretty sure it can be done. I mean become and keep a quite stable population. First you have to be very patient and than have a working, long term strategy, and stick to it.

Sorry, I think you are going the wrong way, so far. Building a certain number of houses each year cannot be successful. To look at the demographics, that's the way to go. Only build houses if they are needed. And yes, of cause you must stop building houses at some point. But you must also consider each cycle is about 19 years. If you have a babyboom today, you will have a lot of deaths 19 years later, and in the meantime, this babyboom has an influence on everything.

I will try to reach a stable population in my slow Doolin. This will be my first strategy for the next 14 years or so: (I have followed this strategy about 5 years so far). I will plan my building after the birthrate (I agree with you; better statistics would make it easier) But to make it easy, I will look at the number of children. I will try to keep about 55 children the next 19 years. If it  goes below 50, I will build houses. If it goes over 60 I will even close houses. That means; send old people to the boardinghouse and "fake-demolish" their house. If I could keep it that way, it would mean 420-450 inhabitants in the end and about 140 houses. We will see, maybe I have to change strategy or maybe as some people say; it isn't possible.

I'll let you know in my blog how it will go.

[irrelevant]

@Nilla I agree with a most of what you say. The idea of building a set number of houses comes from a reluctance to go chasing after data feedback by "building houses when XXX", when it is mostly unknown how much response is appropriate.  But I'm starting to believe that "build X houses every year" isn't going to work either.

In January, if your house is too cold, you turn up the thermostat; but by how much? And what if there is a window that is wide open, but you don't know that? Or if someone has just built a roaring fire in the den, but your don't know that?

Building houses in response to the number of children is a sensible strategy, but we never know what is happening in the existing houses; did a bunch of codgers just die, and 5 new couples moved in and got busy working on babies, while we are building 5 more houses?

Anyway, this is why I'm skeptical that 350 is a realistic pop target; 1350 might be a better one, as the effect of these sorts of things would be dampened by the sheer size of the pop. Thinking now about what I need to do first to expand Frenchman's Bend. I'd need another TP for one thing. And another large market. And lots more food. Food first.

[irrelevant]

Year 55

Children are crashing, so if I'm going to do something, I need to do it now.

[irrelevant]

There is one other thing to consider besides the number of children to total pop, and that is the number of houses to total pop. If the elusive ideal of no house-building is to be achieved, there must already exist the ideal number of houses to pop.

The most people who can live in a house is 5, the fewest 1. But one is undesirable, we would prefer that the fewest would be two.

That means that the ideal average number of bannies per house is (5+2)/2=3.5

So to my simple mind, it would seem that if I were trying to achieve a stable population of say 1000, I would try to reach pop 1000 at exactly the moment I had 150 children and 285 houses (1000/3.5).

Maybe 290-300 houses to allow for the inevitable widows/widower?

Obviously, I have given up on pop 350 and am aiming at pop 1000.

[irrelevant]

Year 56-57

Beginning to expand towards pop 1000. So for the next few years, Frenchman's Bend is just another boring town.

[Nilla]

First I must say; You are probably right, going from 300 to 1000. It might be a little bit easier. I tried a bit yesterday and had some problems, that would have been a bit less, with a bigger population.(I will probably write about it a little bit later in my blog)

I don't know if your calculation; 1000 population; 150 children, 285 houses is correct. I calculate a little bit different for 1000 population, I would say; 125 children, 315 houses. I will try to tell you how I calculate. I have no idea if I can do that in English. I don't know if it is correct eather.

Ideal demography; each year, the same number of children born. (I think we can agree on this)
That means each woman should have 2 children.
That means ideal first childbirth; 31-34 years. (there is time to have 2 but not 3 children)

This means (small table)

(Age/Population/Number of own houses)
0-10/ 125/ 0 living at the parents
10-20/125/0 living at the parents
20-30/125/0 living at the parents
30-40/125/63
40-50/125/62
50-60/125/63
60-70/125/62
70+/125/65 some live alone
0-90/1000/315

I have a small tip if you want it less boring. This town should live a long time (and if possible without interference from you), so there is no room for overproduction of anything. You could maybe follow my "challenge" from another thread and try to produce enough, but not much too much of everything.

[irrelevant]

@Nilla this makes a great deal of sense. I'll have to give this some more thought.

When I said it would be another boring town, I meant boring for anyone to read about. They never are boring when they are yours.

[Nilla]

Your towns are never boring, at least not for me. I like very much to read about your games. You always have some ideas/strategies/thoughts on what you are doing. Always interesting, even if I sometimes think you are on the wrong way. 

I have a special interest in this game. Almost everyone else say, that it isn't possible to build a town, with a constant population. I think it is! As I kind of know myself quite well after almost 60 years, I suspect that I don't have enough patience to prove this. Maybe you have. If i can, I will support you in this task.