Quote Originally Posted by zbest View Post
I have a different opinion of the root of the problem. I see the root of the problem not being the size of the army, but the amount of resources that are being thrown around due to NPC production. This endless supply of large amounts of resources that can be obtained with very little effort is the cause of the problem, in my opinion.

The risk/reward curve for attacking NPCs is unbalanced. The rewards are way too high, considering there is zero risk.

The marketplace resource price, troop upkeep, and wars have not been able to bring balance back to the game.

Attacking NPCs needs to come with greater risk, and/or less reward.

Lets see now:

1. a player built city with 37 number nine farms, level 9 agriculture, 10 level 10 lakes and a decent mayor will produce about 1 million food per hour - or about 8 million food every 8 hours.

2. A level 5 NPC will produce 3 million food every eight hours, clearly this is not an unrealistic number in relation to what the maxed out player city (without scripts) can produce.

3. a player owned level 10 city (from a capped NPC) will produce (with 40 level 10 farms + lakes + tech + mayor) around 1.5 million per hour - which is about 12 million every 8 hours.

4. the same level 10 city when it was still an NPC would give 19 million (I think thats right) every 8 hours -- but you lose quite a few troops in the process of getting that plunder.

THEREFORE - NPC resource production levels are more or less in line with what you could expect from similarly developed player cities.